Second Leg: Prague & Munich

I took the train from Berlin to Prague on Monday the 7th. There's no direct train running at the moment, so I took a train to Dresden, had a layover there, then a bus to Utsi nad Labem on the other side of the border with the Czech Repbublic, and finally a train from there to Prague.

Prague is a breathtakingly beautiful city. It has dense, interlaced blocks of baroque and gothic and neo-baroque buildings, woven together with tram lines and cobblestone streets and passageways and bridges. It has fantastic topography, with hills and bluffs and a river that runs down the middle and is bridged in a dozen places. The hillsides (those that were forested) were dressed in autumn colors and the sun came out so it was all lit up against the November sky.

It's an old city. It's a Slavic city, along with the rest of the Czech republic, and it was on the other side of the Iron Curtain for much of the 20th century. These historic forces are always compelling as I travel. In heading to Prague I hopped over the old border between the Eastern and Western blocs for the first time in my life. I also stepped into the Slavic world for the first time.

In Germany I can pick out many written words, partly by triangulating with English and the little Danish I can read, both of which are Germanic languages. The pronunciation of German is also much easier than Danish. It's linguistic territory that I have some stake in. Passing into the Czech republic that certainly went out the window. Every sign was a bizarre hieroglyphic, inviting the more intuitive senses to one's direction.

The legacy of the years spent under communism could also be felt and seen, not least because Kiel and I went to the dusty Communism Museum just after I arrived in Prague. I'm speak to the economic and social legacy of that system, except to note two things: there is a notable difference in wealth here compared to Germany (they did not benefit from the big economic boost of the Marshall plan), and that long, austere apartment blocks are quite common. Still, based solely on the excellent tram network, the government seems to function well.

Kiel and I had a great time walking around, drinking beer, riding trams, finding strange places, talking to Australians. After a distressing night and early morning, however, Kiel headed off to the Airport and I headed to the train station on the 9th.

I rode the train to Munich (Munchen), in Germany. It was a beautiful train ride, through the hilly country of Bohemia. I love these train rides. I love land, seeing it move, flow, the colors it expresses, the overlapping natural features and working places; forest, hill, stone, farm, stream, village, transitioning from one kind of thing into another. That we're at the tail end of the beautiful autumn colors, and that the first snows are beginning to fall, does not hurt one bit.

Munich is the capital of Bavaria (Bayern) and is a proud, hearty, bustling city. I stayed with my friend Andreas who is from the Bavarian countryside and has a sister living in the city. We went out to Haupbrauhaus and Augustiner Brauhaus, a couple of classic beer and sausage and oompa band beer halls in the old city. It was a hoot. Beer is meant to be drunk out of a 1 liter mug I think.

 

The next day Andreas and I went back into town and he showed me some more of the classic spots. One place we went was Dallmayr, a store and coffee roasting company. It's sort of like a supermarket, all indoors and with a beautiful wood, brass and glass interior, except every section is behind a counter, with uniformed staff, like in a proper market. There's a fish counter and a sweets counter and a tea counter, a coffee counter, a sausage counter and a cheese counter. We also went by the outdoor market and I bought a loaf of bread, fresh butter, and cheese. The cheese was good and cheap by American standards, but the bread and butter were unbelievably delicious. To have something so simple turn out to be so good, or have become so used to something good in a simplified, industrialized form, is revelatory.

After eating this cheese and butter and break by the river Isar during a sunbreak I hopped on a train to Austria. I decided to get an earlier train to Salzburg so I would have more daylight and get closer to the Alps. I got off the train at the wrong place so I had an hour to explore a little town called Traunstein on a bluff over a stream, with steep stairs leading down the bluff from the central square through and between buildings to houses below, which were built right up to the edge of the stream. I got back on the train after the sun had set and crossed the border into Austria, bound for Vienna.