spent a week in the Czech Republic.

I spent most of the week in Prague. My time there, I saw maybe 6 blacks, and maybe a dozen muslims (outwardly). Saw maybe 500 Asian, mostly tourists. Most people under 40 are fluent in English, the youngest people in their 20's can speak without an accent. Didn't take a taxi or uber the entire time I was there, bought a few 72 hour passes for $13 for public transportation which covered buses, trams, trains and cable cars. Took about 15 minutes to figure out the transportation system and google maps laid it out for you. You just type in the address and looked for the tram number it gave you. Didn't see a single part of the city I didn't feel safe in. Walked around until midnight almost every night I was there.

A bottled water is about $1.75, a half litre of beer on tap is $1.25.

That's why they have the highest per capita beer consumption in the world, and their pilsner beer is really, really good.
typical meal is Schikova (sheesh-ku-va), Beef or pork in a cream sauce with boiled dumplings for about $6

goulash, duck and pork are mainstays on their menu.


Some more pics

can't say I'd want to live there but there are definite positives

Awesome thanks KWFA .

Awesome photos, I absolutely love their beer.

It would be better than a lot of places in this country.

Great photos, beautiful there!

It appears there's much to commend the place!

FC

Great pics! Thank you for sharing.

My roommate in college did a semester in Prague 20 years ago. He loved it there. He got up on a hill and took a panoramic picture of the city down below. Printed it out as about 8" tall by 30" long. Made for a cool wall hanging in our apartment. He hated beer before he went, but on his return that is all he would drink.

Could you elaborate on both thoughts?

Looks like a cool place to visit. Nice photos as well.

Nice.

I'll be in Prague next May for a few days. Do you have any "can't miss" sites I should see while there?

I'm looking forward to that Czech beer.

Awesome! Thanks for sharing. The Czechs have a strong hunting heritage...how are the gun laws?

Looks like a great trip. Thanks for sharing. We’re always looking fo new interesting places to visit.

Paradise ?

It looks like an amazing place to visit!

Glad you had a good time, it’s an awesome place. Took a couple day trips to Prague last year while on TDY. One of my favorite cities. Great food, great folks. Stay away from the street food in the square by the astronomical clock, there is cheaper, better food literally anywhere else in the city. If you’re looking for must see things, I’d hit Prague castle and St Vitus cathedral, where you can see the tomb of King Wenceslas of Christmas song fame. Also the astronomical clock is really interesting considering when it was built. Walk the Charles bridge but keep your hand on your wallet. About an hour out of town is the Sedlec Ossuary, also known as the Bone Church. Really odd, but fascinating in a gruesome way. Oh, and the beer.....

Old70

Beautiful Country.

Thanks for the write up. Nice photos. Looks like fun.

When my wife suggests a trip like this-----My only question---what do they hunt there?

Russians?

If you have time I'd suggest a couple of things - one, do the Taste of Prague tour where they will take you to traditional Prague/Czech food places and if you want to see the natural beauty (the outdoor photos) then I'd would suggest a tour with Bohemia Adventures. You'll probably hit the standards - the main castle and Charles Bridge but there is another castle that is off the beaten path a bit, has its own beer garden and picnic area called Vysehrad Castle. Its definitely worth going to if you want to get away from the crowds.

Sorry, can't answer any questions about hunting or gun laws, although I did see a gun shop in the city advertising a few weapons, I didn't see much about CZ while I was there.

well I think my second sentence pretty much sums of why you'd want to be there - the reasons why not are taxes, socialism, -standard Euro issues.

Cost of living seems tolerable though and they have a good balance of industry, farming and tech. I went there for tech.

Cool, thanks.

Great pics! Thanks for sharing them

Do you know to what level the Czech's practice socialism? Does the government control what industry make, quantities, prices, etc? Are there multiple parties in the country?

no expert - they are multi party with a parliament but socialist and communists drive their version of the democratic party as I understand it.
They are part of the EU so I don't think they are still in that state run industry concept, and certainly small business is thriving. I suspect they have really backed off the bureaucracy required to open and run a business. Its a fairly wealthy country from the post soviet era blocks that broke up and they want the business protections and opportunities afforded to them as part of the EU

Are you the the pretty lady in the pics? If so you look very Czech yourself. Probably fit right in

I spent a few days there in 1996 when on leave from a deployment to Italy. It hadn’t been too long since the iron curtain fell and they were rebuilding from that. It was good to get to see it before it became touristy. Beautiful city with beautiful women, Czech girls are stunning. At that time I saw zero blacks, zero Muslims, & zero Asians. You could get by with English but it sounds like they’ve adopted it much more now.

It was really cheap then, the exchange rate was crazy & the cheapest place for beer was a bar that had been built in a nuke fallout shelter below the city. Some guy had rented it and put in a bunch of big oak tables and had a guy with a guitar singing in the corner & a few busty blonde Czech waitresses slinging beers. It was packed and the (good) beer was 11 cents a pint. Capitalism at it’s finest. There wasn’t really any public transportation and you had to watch out for the cab drivers, they’d rip you off once they figured out you were American and had money. As a rule though the Czechs loved Americans at that time, I hope it’s still the same.

I agree with KFWA about it still being Europe and having all the Euro issues, you’re never going to get them to give up on socialism, it’s too ingrained in them. Heck, we can’t get 90% of the U.S. to toss that garbage. I think the Czechs are probably more receptive to freedom than most of Western Europe though. Nothing makes you appreciate it like living under the Soviet Union for 50 years.

Looks like a great time. If I could stand being cramped on a plane I'd like to see Poland, The Czech Republic, and Hungary.

When it appeared it set the standard for golden lager beer. If you're drinking a mass market American version you're sucking hind tit in comparison.

Those guys came over here and started our beer industry.

for October I found out that Pilsner Urquell makes a special batch of beer that isn't pasteurized or heavily filtered - its made just like it was (or close to it) back in the 1800s. It has a shelf life of about 20 days but that doesn't seem to be a problem there. So I was drinking that all week.

my wife's heritage is from that part of the country

Ours has decayed since.

I've always wanted to visit there. My brother spent some time there mid 90s and loved it.

Bb

Great thread, thanks for sharing!

Great pic’s.

From the places I’ve been to and the pictures I’ve seen (admittedly pic’s are inherently biased toward their goal), western Europe is generally clean and neat. The US with its tradition of individualism and property rights has allowed much of its beautiful landscape to intermittently resemble a dump.

While full-on socialism fails miserably and I dislike top-down rules and regulations, there is no doubt many folks need “guidance” as to the state of their property.

I'm sure the novelty would wear off fast enough but being suburbs guy, I loved being able to walk 2 blocks, hop on a tram and 15 minutes later I was anywhere in the city I wanted to be.

You just don't think like that where I live, to drive anywhere downtown, with parking its at least 45 minutes.

I'd never think to leave at 8:00pm to go downtown - not only for traffic but for various potential undesireables, but with a tram, you're just like - screw it , lets go get Vietnamese pho at that place we saw last night. It never occurred to consider if its a bad part of the city, there wasn't one as far as I knew.

our last night there we had about $150 in various Czech currency so we picked out a higher end grocery store with a wine selection and loaded up on chocolate and wine to bring back

there is a direct flight from Philadelphia, its just under 8 hours. I bought my ticket and then paid $118 for a seat upgrade that gave me leg room, an aisle location and free alcohol. It also gave me priority seating so I could get my stuff in an overhead bin.

After 8 hours you still have to go thru customs, In Prague that took about 20 minutes, In the states it took about an hour - plus I was singled out. Seems they took exception to my somewhat standard name as a potential bad guy that deserved more scrutiny. That's the 3rd time I've come back into the states and had to go to the "special room" from customs.

One other thing to note, they smoke weed as openly as they do in Colorado

you can buy this just about anywhere

Great pictures, kfwa. Thanks for sharing.


I would add Cesky Krumlov to the outside of Prague places to see. We unfortunately did not make it there. A small Middle Ages town skipped over by the Renaissance. Scheduling conflicts on the shortest trip we ever took to Europe. Would NEVER do that again. Pressure from GF's sister. Next time, I would just tell the dumbass to stay home.

All of the cool stuff is from the Middle Ages when one stonemason’s life’s work would be to carve 20 statues for the facade of a church. We can’t afford that nowadays, the training to master skills like that takes so long that it’s impossible to support a system like that without slave labor, which essentially everyone was unless you were of the nobility. A skilled artisan like that was basically just a higher class of indentured servant than the field hands.

Look at any of the architecture from post WWII Germany, France or the UK. It’s dreadful, way worse than most of the US. The state of maintenance of our cities mostly comes from who inhabits them, blacks and Mexicans are going to destroy anything they touch. It’s the same in the Muslim parts of Paris, London or Frankfurt. I spend a lot of time in Europe with my job, trust me that there are plenty of chithole parts in any city in Europe, the tourists just don’t go there to see them.

Prague was saved from bombing in WWII because Hitler wanted the city as his new capital, so he demanded they take the city by foot soldiers.

Great pics, but I think you have a blonde stalking you.

i have a cousin living in zagreb, she is croat. speaks about three languages including english. Her girls by age of 12 spoke fluent english.
I have done a lot of bumming around in that area, mostly croatia/slovakia. some of the smaller villages are outstanding as to the houses and beauty of the countryside. Number of years ago asked the cousin if i came over with about 70k to buy a house and a 2k a month retirement income, how would it work out? Answer, a small castle to live in, and at the time about four times the median income, would live well.
Just because it's kind of central europe doesn't mean it's way behind. Medical systems other things in some ways better than here.
As to the food, well, i grew up on that stuff.

as to the czech gun laws:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_law_in_the_Czech_Republic

interesting in that i know several people in belgium owning garands, carbines, and one guy a marlin 30.30 model 336. It isn't as restrictive in some areas as you might assume.
one guy in germany is using dillon reloading equipment.