Day 7

Holy cow. I'm too tired to write much today! We did a walking tour of Pilzen. Our guides were some local University and high school kids (we spend alot of time with the kids because they know more English than the adults do). They took us to Saint Bartholomews. We walked all the way to the very top (that is 306 stairs for your information). It had a wonderful view of the city and the surrounding country. After that our tourguides lead us on a tour of underground Pilzen. Basically, this is a series of cellars that were originally created for storing beer back in the day (I'm talking like Medieval time, y'all) then because of fire safety concerns and the fear of mauraders, they created underground tunnels to connect these cellars. The underground network spans the entire length of the city out into the surrounding areas. It was very useful during WWII for smuggling and hiding people and forbidden materials. After our tour of the underground, we had a quick snack in Pilzen square where we watched the parade of American Army Artilery as they paraded around the square. Then we went to lunch at the Pilsner Urquell Brewery. I really thought the food was nothing fabulous, so I won't describe it in detail. After that, we walked past an American Army re-enactment of Patton's camp, by Pilzen city walls. That was on our way to our first Czech Soccer (or football) game. We stayed for one half, and then headed off to an old church to listen to a Baroque music concert. After that, we had dinner at a little Czech Pub. I ordered Smasovaska (sp?) which is basically toast, with eggs, and cheese. The Czech call it "Beer Food". I said it went just fine with my Coca Cola Light (which by the way is much tastier than Diet Coke. I think its because they use ingredients which are not approved by the FDA).

Each day while I'm here in the CR, i'm trying to learn new words in Czech. I actually had two new words of the day today: Caj (which is prounounced "Chai" and means, duh, tea) and Hracky (which is prounounced "Huh-rach-key" and means toys). I'll keep you updated on the words I pick for tommorow.