Europe Tour 2024 (Series Part 3)

(Part 3 of a Series)

Day 3 of the tour
Day 1 was spent in transit which led to Day 1.5 and Day 2. This is Day 3 of our Europe Tour, and based on the planned schedule, we're going to Prague!

DK and I had a good night's sleep at Blasky Hotel in Frankfurt. Breakfast was included and we were treated to one of my favorite breakfast food items--smoked salmon. I think I ate four servings. (Hahaha)

Also, I had to take a photo of this cheese. I think it's cheddar. It's my first time to actually encounter the stereotyped European cheese with holes in them. I only saw these in cartoons I watched when I was young but here they are now. I don't eat cheese that much but it was a good experience to try and taste them.

We were told to get breakfast--fast. Since we should be leaving by 6:45am since Prague would take at least five hours.

Side Story: A conversation with Arthur, our transporter

I recognized Arthur from yesterday when he picked us up from Frankfurt airport. For my eyes, Arthur is a stereotypical European, a large human with strong facial features and scary demeanor. But in the week we spent with him, I found that he's a gentle giant and a hard worker.

A photo of Arthur, DK and me.

He sat down in the table next to ours during breakfast. I struck a conversation with him by asking, "Are you going to be our transporter?"

(BTW, I love using the term "Transporter" instead of driver. For me it's more hardcore and professional, just like the movie.)

Arthur just gave me a nod. I remember asking more questions, like will the trip be long, how the traffic in Germany is, and other traffic-related questions. I tried putting my questions in the most basic english possible because I just felt it's better. And I initially thought that Arthur may not understand me if I speak too much slang (even though I really can't).

Arthur said, "Germany, early, no traffic. Maybe later." He continued with, "Going outside Germany, traffic slow. In Dresden there are... What english word..."

He mentioned something in his native language which we found out later is Polish.

"Farmer," I asked if he's referring to tractors, to which he said "ahh yes." He told a quick story of how farmers driving their tractors on the road slow down traffic flow, and German drivers just shrug it off.

The touching part of my short conversation with Arthur is when he said this: "Traffic going in and out of Germany is slow because of farmers, but you will not hear drivers getting angry and honking horns. Everyone is patient because we understand. We need them to bring food. It is more patient in East. Because of the war and there are worse problems to think of."

Arthur was referring to the war in Ukraine. It's his way of saying that the war affects all of Europe one way or another, they each have a role to play in making sure life continues as normally as possible, and that they're all hoping for the war to end already.

Travelling to Prague

In Europe, transporters are required to make a fifteen-minute stop every two hours. Our tour guide told us that this is to ensure that all transporters are in optimal driving status, which in turn led to less traffic accidents in the highway. Based on the schedule, we will be making at least two stops, with the first for a toilet break, and the second for a lunch break.

Not much happened on the first stop. The second stop, the lunch break stop, was exciting.

It was a small rest stop but it had a fast-food section. The queue was long and the wait was at least ten minutes for the food. The stop was still in Germany territory

It was a funny experience for me because I didn't learn even the most basic German tourist phrases and I'm always the frontliner when we travel. Since this is the first interaction with a stranger for this trip, what kicked in was my Japan tourist mode.

Me: "I'll have a frikkadeli and a curry vurst, two drinks, please."
Cashier: "Frikka--huh?"
Me: (getting the pronunciation correct) "Frikadelle."
Cashier: (something in German that confirms my order) "...Okay. Will it be for here?"
Me: "HAI."

After paying I realized that I answered in Japanese.

So here's DK with her choice: the Frikadelle. Based on the description it's potato fries topped with some salad and a dressing of some sort, with sausages. I chose the curry wurst, which is basically a chopped-up sausage topped with curry, with a bunch of fries.

The curry was suprisingly tasty but not as strong of a curry as I'm used to.

Lessons learned? Food portions are large and can be shared. And look, no rice! We're doomed.

After everyone in the tour group finished our meals, we went back to the bus and proceeded with our travel to Prague.

I managed to capture some images of the highway. There's a lot of open space and a lot of nature. I felt a little sleepy but I was trying to catch a glimpse of any landscape similar to the "Windows XP Default Wallpaper" but I think it's not taken in this area.

How did I manage to take these photos? I held my phone in the bus aisle and zoomed in at I think 7%. I didn't get to see Windows XP, so I took a nap.

I woke to the sound of our tour guide mentioning that we entered the city and we are just going to the designated parking spot. I captured the photo of the bridge, the name of which I forgot, over the river whose name I also forgot.

We took a spot in the bus parking in front of Praha Hlavní Nádraží. From what I gathered, it's the grand central station or the Main Station for trains. I'd say from the way it's designed, it does deserve the name.

We didn't go in the station because we didn't need to. From what I observed from outside the station, it looks like any other train station but the inside was wide and very, very busy.

The station was a convenient parking place since it's only ten minutes away from the city center, where the St. Charles' square, the museum and shopping district was located.

Sadly, we didn't have time to actually go in the museum. Here's the view of the museum, the monument and the square I captured:

We walked to the lower end of the square to find a place to eat. Just for the fun of it, we went to McDonald's.

Well, nothing much to say about McDonald's in Prague except that I'm amazed at how they're able to implement their standards. There wasn't much difference, in the items, maybe... But the front-end system was the same. The ordering kiosk is very much the same. Good thing there was English language available so we were able to choose and order. The number queueing system for claiming orders is implemented.

The food? Hahaha. It tastes the same! The cheeseburger and fries taste the same. The differences? The cola is less sweet and you pay for the ketchup. The McDonald's in my country gives away a reasonable amount of ketchup packets. I do make sure that I always get just enough and I even return excess ketchup packets if I think I won't consume them.

Here's a video of DK showcasing our McDonald's meal which cost us around 75% more than what we'd pay for.

BTW, in the end of the video I mentioned that I measured the bun and I got 30cm, which apparently is the same size as in Prague's.

After our meal, we made our way down to the intersection. Since it was already dark and we had to make the assembly time, we started going back to the monument. I forgot the exact time at that point but it was night already, but I don't think it was that late at all.

Anyway, I took a slo-mo video in an attempt to capture the night view of the busy street.

And that's the kinda underwhelming end to Day 3 of our tour, in Prague.

We got back to the bus, waited a little because it was a pretty long walk back to Praha Hlavní Nádraží. I can't remember the way we took because I felt pretty tired and sleepy since we left Frankfurt really early.

We stayed at Comfort Hotel.

After settling and checking in, I got a beer which I forgot to take a photo of and I can't remember if it's the original Budweiser. We prepared the stuff we need for the next day and got our good night's sleep.