A Blog Siesta

We are deep in the heart of winter, here in Central Europe. Although, this weekend is the first real snow I remember seeing this winter. Maybe the deep winter gray has inspired contemplation in me. Or maybe it is laziness trying to disguise itself as self-reflection.

But in any case, I have decided to take a "Blog Siesta". At least for the winter I'd like to step away from the online writing and live a little more, offline.

So, thank you for reading what was written in 2011. When my creative juices start flowing and my feet start walking and the introvert in me has taken all the time it needs to recover from a very public 2011, then I'll be back with travel stories, tips of places to go and Prague ideas....

To travel is to live.

Long Weekend

My H works abroad, which means we don't see each other all that often...but when we do, we know how to have a good time. A car, a full tank and an open road is what we love. This weekend was a holiday weekend in the Czech Republic. We did a bit of house work for a day or two and then decided we needed a break.

We got into the car and H started to drive. I'm usually the navigator but this time he knew where he was going and I was not in the loop. Our drive took us down some very narrow and curvy country roads. Good thing neither of us get motion sickness!

At the end of the road we stopped in an adorable, historical town called Rabštejn. The small house are maintained in their original style of the 19th century. There is a lovely 5k trail that runs through and around the village. The highlights along the trail are a hunting lodge that serves mouth-watering strudel, a rickety wooden bridge, a babbling brook and a Jewish cemetery.

On the way home we got a little turned around so we pulled into the parking lot of a monastery to check the map. Little did we know that they were holding a model airplane exhibition, although I accused my airplane enthusiast husband of planning the stop. We hoped out at Mariánský Týnec monastery and were welcomed into a lovely and warm place full of Czech cultural exhibitions showing traditional clothing, celebrations and household items.

What great surprises, planned and unplanned!

"Oh, the places you will go"

My first international experience was to Thailand in 1994. I was a 14 year old kid that had dreamed of nothing but foreign lands for all of her short life and there I was. The leader of our group read us the Dr Suess book "Oh, The Places You will Go" and I took that as my mantra. I wanted to "go places". I spent the next five years of my life raising money, working after school and pinching every penny so that I could spend my summers abroad. Before my 20th birthday I had been to Thailand twice, India, Bolivia and Russia. But spending a few weeks every summer exploring the unknown wasn't enough. I needed to live there.

So, I got a degree in teaching English as a means to take myself globe-trotting and when I finished at Ohio University I got myself a job in Central Europe. I landed in the Czech Republic with no expectations, no plans to stay or to wander, no idea what would come next.

And here I sit, eight years later, in the most beautiful city in the world. I didn't know back then that I would marry into this deep culture and rich land. I didn't know I'd grow and learn and change. I didn't know I'd be happier than I ever expected. But I am.

I'll be blogging some of those happy events over the next few weeks. Stay tuned to the adventures of what happens when traveling becomes living....