Another chilly morning and I expected many warm hours on the bus. Wrong! First stop was a national park for a hike! Is the gift shop open by chance?

Back to the bus for the drive to a deserted village and a home hosted lunch. Interesting backstory. After the war the area of the Sudetenland was returned to Czechoslovakia. They wanted the land back but they did not want the ethnic Germans who lived there because they were loyal to Hilter so they expelled 3,000,000 of them. This area had some of the largest houses in Germany. Basically they were given away to anyone that wanted them and of course, the people did not know how to farm, etc. so they failed. Now there are abandoned villages and villages with small populations.

Our home hosted dinner was one of these abandoned houses that Sonia and her husband restored. The village wanted to demolish the building but it was too expensive because the house was so large. The before to the after, where we had lunch, was unbelievable. They could have made an HTV show about it. The best part is that Sonia and her family have contact with the original German owners of the home who were expelled from the house (and received no compensation.). There are many pictures of the original family on the walls.

My lunch was a wonderful couscous salad. Everyone else had traditional Czech food that consisted of meat, gravy and dumplings.

Our last stop on the way to Prague was a stop at Terezin, a fortress that was used by the Gestapo as a prison. I couldn’t take pictures. A very somber hour.

Our hotel in Prague is centrally located in the old town. OAT excels at picking these kind of hotels. The last member of our group arrived, the wonderful Laura from California. We finally went shopping and I bought a very overpriced sweatshirt and hood from Under Armour. Pink, of course.