For my 36th b-day we took a very fun, quick trip to Prague. It was a pretty, 4.5-hour drive northeast; cutting across the Romantic Road in upper Bavaria, then on a brand new stretch of autobahn into CZ. Only an hour after the (deserted) border and we were there; unbelievable! Not surprisingly, CZ looks a lot like DE, with the rolling hills and thick forests divided by little farms. But the architecture was the main difference: the houses were a little more rough and rustic in the country side, and there’s a noticeable increase in onion-domed churches. In Prague city there are endless gothic spires–and my favorite part–the lavish, wedding-cake baroque details. It was easy to see why Prague is known as the “Golden City of Spires.” We spent a day strolling the squares and climbing the hills of the city with the dogs, enjoying the last hours of pleasant Fall weather. Later that night we actually had Mexican food, which sounds crazy but since Czech cuisine is pretty similar to German (which we get a bit tired of,) whenever we go to big cities we often end up eating ethnic: sushi, vietnamese…whatever we can get outside of our little corner of Swabia. The next day–my actual b-day–we drove back home and along the way stopped in the town of Plzen, or more familiar to our beer-drinking buddies, Pilsen. The biggest draw-and employer-in the quiet, industrial town is of course the Plzensky Prazdroj brewery, whose most famous product is Pilsner Urquell. We didn’t have time for the big tour and just had lunch in their big bier hall, but the historic cellars and brewing antiques of the place definitely require a special trip back…maybe combined with a Czech spa town tour Aside from seeing Prague, Curt’s other ‘gift’ to me was letting me enjoy all the beer while he drove all the way back to DE. Yipee!!