Day 3
Avoid Czech highways around the big cities!
No kidding.
We're not interested in big cities. We thought that whizzing around them with the highway was a good idea. Nope. Worst plan ever!
Prague and Brno are impressively large cities by the km2 they use. My impression was backed by the figures I found on Wikipedia last night. They are sprawling cities. The density of population is not high by the standard of other large European cities, and yet there's a lot of folks on the belt/ring around these cities. And trucks. A strikingly large amount of trucks that fill the numerous petrol stations along the highway.
It was a total-non-time-saver, and it was stressful. 150 km in 3 hours. Congestions where the 3 lanes shrink to 2 or to 1 due to road work, aggressive driving, speeding... you name it. We left the bustling Southernly part of Czech Republic with relief. We'll come back through the small roads.
Now the best part!
Slovakia!
We arrived last night, after dark, under the rain, and we parked in a spot close to the border that was mentioned in P4N.
The morning sky was extremely clement. The shower curtains opened on the most exquisite view :)
Ah yes... the shower!
And the feeling improved on every minute from there on :)
We found a bakery and had local sweet pastries for breakfast. Bliss.
Then we hit the road at our usual
leisury pace, and we heard neither honks nor raging engines overtaking us. In fact, we were seldom
overtaken, always in the most civil way. People smile, people stop and talk to each others in the street, people engage without a common language. Ok. I learned "Hello!" and "bicycle", and already forgot "Thank you"...
Boy it feels good, and not only because the vowels are back!
And they know their coffee!
