Winter in Prague

After spending Christmas in Paris, it was time for us to go back to Prague.  This city is truly magical, but even more so in the winter.  The Christmas market in the Old Town Square is the best one I've been to in Europe.  You can't beat the atmosphere!  The food is delicious, the street performers are great, there's a petting zoo with cute animals, a huge Christmas tree, and the surrounding historic buildings of the square are beautiful.

This time around we went to some new places.  One that was recommended to us was called U Fleku - a traditional Czech pub.  It was great!  You eat at tables right next to other guests and a man goes around and plays the accordion.  The main draw is the meat dishes and beer of course.  I ordered a traditional Czech meal which was beef with cranberry sauce, lemon, and cream, served with bread dumplings.  This place is popular so if you get in right away you're lucky!  We also went to another pub called U Medvidku which was even more popular with a very long line, but the service was very disappointing and I don't think I'd return there again.  Our friends that visited before said it was worse than the last time they visited!

We also hit up my favourite restaurant Mlejnice which has cheap, delicious Czech food in a cozy setting, and the famous and very old Cafe Louvre for brunch.  The only problem with Czech food is that it's very rich!  You have to walk around a lot to burn all the calories you're eating.

No trip to Prague would be complete without a visit to the Charles Bridge, where we got engaged several years ago.  This year it seemed that Prague was extra busy, and the bridge along with the Christmas market were packed.  I don't remember our last Christmas visits to Prague being so heavily crowded... I guess everyone has realized that this city is the place to be during the Christmas season!

From the Charles Bridge, we returned to some great places like the John Lennon wall (one of my faves, it's so colourful!) and took a hike up to Strahov Monastery for some great views of the city and to check out the opulent monastery library again.  This time we stopped at a small pub next to the monastery to try some blueberry beer which was brewed there.  It was pretty good!

Something else we did that was new for John and I was attend a hockey game in Prague.  We went to O2 Arena by metro to catch a game - HC Sparta Praha vs. another local team called Mountfield Praha.  Tickets were very cheap, less than $10 I think, and it was a lot of fun!  The fans were actually really intense and always cheering and singing songs.  The Spartans won to the crowd's excitement!

Before leaving Prague we went to St. Jilji Church where we got married in 2014.  What a beautiful place!  I know that we'll be back yet again some day... :)

Paris... je t'aime!

After my third visit to Paris I'm still not satisfied.  This city just keeps me wanting to go back.  It's my favourite city, even more than Prague I think.  Prague is so beautiful and a great destination, but I find that Paris has so much more to see.  You could spend days upon days there and still just have scratched the surface.  Some people don't like Paris, complaining that it's too dirty or expensive, but to me it's a beautiful place that still intrigues me.  There are so many diverse neighbourhoods of the city and so many brilliant museums, cathedrals, and tourist attractions.  Yes, it can be expensive, but if you look hard enough you can find reasonable options for food and accommodations.

This time around we stayed in the Latin Quarter near Place Saint-Michel and Notre Dame, which is a touristy area but is also known for being home to many university students.  I really liked this area of the city, as we were within close walking distance to many restaurants and also to the Seine river which we loved walking along.  The weather in Paris was quite mild when we were there.  It felt more like fall weather than winter time.  Due to the lovely weather, we walked almost everywhere.  We could have easily hopped on a metro, but with all the rich foods we were eating on the trip, it was great exercise to walk around, and a nicer way to see the city.

One place that I've been meaning to visit was le Musée d'Orsay, a beautiful art museum which used to be a train station.  It's much smaller than the Louvre, but you can easily spend all day there.  My favourite thing there was the Impressionist paintings.  I got to see some of my favourite Monet paintings in person.  There were also a number of sculptures that we enjoyed by a French sculptor named Pompon.  The biggest one he had was a huge polar bear, entitled "L'ours blanc."  The museum has a beautiful view of the Seine and Montmartre in the distance, where many of the Impressionist painters lived.

One of our favourite things we've ever done in Paris was to go up l'Arc de Triomphe to see an amazing view of Paris.  We didn't go up there this time around, but we did visit l'Avenue des Champs-Élysées and the Christmas market there.  It was huge, but it didn't have the traditional Christmas feel like other Christmas markets in Europe have.  There was also a Christmas market right near the Eiffel Tower.  My favourite Christmas market is still the one in Prague, but Budapest impressed me a lot as well.  Maybe some of the lack of Christmas spirit stemmed from the recent tragedy in Paris.  After the bombings, security was on high alert.  We saw lots of police around the city, and at many tourist sites there were bag checks and police dogs.  At the airport we saw guards with huge guns, and I felt a bit nervous to be travelling there so soon after the bombings, but I admire the people of Paris for being so resilient and having the courage to move on and say that they are not afraid to live their lives.

On Christmas day we went to Montmartre for a Christmas mass in the morning.  The last time we visited Paris, we stayed in the Montmartre area.  I love that part of the city even though it's a bit far from the main attractions and requires public transportation to get there.  I love wandering around the streets there!  The view on Christmas morning of the city quiet below us was beautiful.

Another new place we visited in Paris on this trip was les Jardins du Luxembourg.  This places was very close to our hotel.  We visited the park on a sunny day and enjoyed watching the birds and people while sitting on the chairs near the pond there.  If I lived in Paris I'd go to that park all the time!

We also visited la Sainte-Chapelle which was a beautiful chapel close to Notre Dame.  It is famous for its stained glass windows.  People often try to time their visits perfectly so that they can get the sunlight shining through the windows at the right time.  We visited on a day with some sun and it was a beautiful place.

Over the two previous visits I've made to Paris, I've gotten photos of the Eiffel Tower from a range of viewpoints.  This time we went to Trocadero to get a new view, and it was pretty spectacular.  There was a huge crowd of protesters and a bunch of construction going on at the time we were there, but it didn't stop us from enjoying our time and getting some lovely pics.  I'll never forget the first time I saw the Eiffel Tower... it will stay with me forever!  Views of la tour Eiffel never get old for me. 

Even after three visits I still feel there is so much more to see of Paris.  I feel a bit of sadness looking back on this trip, as I still wish I could be there!  Until next time...

Christmas markets, spas, and so much more in Budapest!

For my first post of 2016 I'm getting around to posting about our Christmas holiday... 2 months late, oops!  Our first destination was Budapest, Hungary.  It was the second time we visited this city, and this time around I enjoyed it even more than the first.  The first time we visited it was in January, and all the Christmas markets were shut down.  This time around we got to enjoy the beautiful Christmas markets of Budapest, and I think they are among some of the best we've seen which was a bit surprising since we never heard much about them before, as they haven't been on the lists of top Christmas markets in Europe that I've read.

In Budapest we stayed at Hotel Gellert which was located on the "Buda" side of Budapest.  You can reach it by crossing the Danube river from the Pest side on one of the bridges that goes over the river.  The hotel was very close to the Liberty Bridge and directly adjacent to the tram and metro stops, so it was easy to go back and forth from Buda to Pest.  We got upgraded to a huge suite with a balcony that had a great view of the Danube.  The hotel also gave us a huge breakfast buffet.  I would definitely recommend this place if you ever find yourself in Budapest!  This historic hotel was also attached to the Gellert Baths, and we got one free entry to visit there.  The Gellert Spa was much smaller than the Szechenyi Baths which we visited the last time we were in Budapest, but it was also very nice.  It had tiled walls and fountains inside, with a few different hot and cold pools and a swimming pool which had waves in it as well.  The hotel was also right on a street with lots of restaurants and bars.

The best thing in Budapest that we did was visit the Christmas market.  There was a huge one at Vorosmarty Square which had tons of Hungarian food like chicken paprika, cabbage rolls, langos (fried bread), pork knee, mulled wine, and more!

In Budapest we did a free walking tour again since we were travelling with our friends MC and Scot who had never been there before.  The tour took us to some of the best places in Budapest like Castle Hill and St. Stephen's Basilica.  This time we went to the top of the basilica which had a great view of the city, but it was a lot of stairs!  You could also take an elevator but with all the eating we were doing, we decided to huff it up the stairs!

We also visited the huge bath house Szechenyi again.  I enjoy the warm pools which were around 37-40 degrees Celsius, but John was brave and tried several cold pools.  I went in one which was 20 degrees and it was a huge shock.  I didn't enjoy it but John did!

Right near Szechenyi at Heroes Square we discovered a massive skating rink.  It is apparently the biggest outdoor skating rink in Europe.  We tried to go there but the line was huge to rent skates, so we decided to have dinner first and then return later.  We went to a traditional Hungarian restaurant called Bagolyvár and we ordered the set menu.  I had pumpkin cream soup, turkey medallions with chestnut and quince, and a sponge cake for dessert.  It was all very delicious!  After dinner we went back to the skating rink and realized it had closed... oh well!

One new thing we did in Budapest this time was visit Országház, the Hungarian parliament building.  You need to reserve tickets online which are a bit pricey compared to all the other tourist sites in the city, and the tour is only around 45 minutes, but it's a cool building and I'm glad that we went.  We even got to see the crown jewels inside, but there were guards standing there and no photos allowed!  After visiting the parliament we walked along the Danube and saw the memorial "Shoes on the Danube" which was quite beautiful but very sad, as it is a tribute to the Jews who were forced to strip naked, face the Danube, and die as a result of a firing squad in WWII, their shoes left on the bank and bodies swept away by the river.

One of my favourite places in Budapest which we visited last time and also this holiday was the ruin pubs called Szimpla Kert.  Ruin pubs are all over the city and are basically bars that are in abandoned buildings.  It seems like now Szimpla is a tourist attraction.  There was actually a sign and a line of people waiting to get in, whereas three years ago the building was so nondescript.  There was a tiny sign hanging there and it actually did look like an abandoned building still from the outside.  You could have easily walked past it without knowing it was there.  It was a bit disappointing that the place has become so popular and crowded, but I guess with the secret out more people can enjoy it.  I found my favourite wine that we drank last time there.  It's called Goncol and is quite sweet.  We've looked all over the world for it and can only seem to find it at Szimpla Kert!

On one of our last days in Budapest, John and I visited the Central Market Hall which was a huge building full of souvenirs and food.  It was great to walk around and check out all the vendors.  I'd recommend going here if you're looking for souvenirs or something to do on a rainy day.  While we were in Budapest it was foggy and misty weather for most of every day until the morning we left where the sun was out!

 Re-visiting Budapest gave me a whole new appreciation for the city.  It is one of my favourites in Europe for sure.  I hope to go back again some day!

Colourful day in Dubai

At the end of November we spent a beautiful morning at the Dubai Autodrome with 12,000 other people running around throwing colour at each other.  Pretty great day and I have the photos to prove it!  The Color Run claims to be "the happiest 5k on the planet" and it sure is... was hard not to smile!  The run brings out the fun-loving, playful side out in everyone...

Beach weekend in Fujairah

In October John and I made our way to the eastern emirate of Fujairah, around 2 hours away by car.  The drive was very scenic... through the desert and then the mountains until we wound up at the coast of the UAE, overlooking the Gulf of Oman.

We stayed at a place called Sandy Beach Hotel in Al Aqah.  Going to Fujairah was like visiting another country.  It was so different from the fancy skyscrapers of Dubai and Abu Dhabi - much more quiet!  Sandy Beach was a nice place with a great view of a large rock formation in the water called Snoopy Island (because it looks like Snoopy laying down).  At Snoopy Island there was some decent snorkelling, with a bunch of colourful fish and some coral.  Some people have seen turtles and sharks around there, but we didn't spend that much time exploring the waters there.  After going to Sipadan in Borneo, one of the best places in the world for viewing sea life, we're semi-retired from snorkelling and diving.  It was nice to just swim around and relax at the beach there!

One thing we noticed while we were at Sandy Beach was that there were a number of people pitching tents on the public beach on the other side of the hotel's property.  It would be great to go back here and try camping next time!

After our weekend trip to Fujairah, we realized that now we have been to all seven emirates of the United Arab Emirates... Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Ras Al Khaimah, and now Fujairah!  I haven't been to all the Canadian provinces (John has!) but have now toured the whole UAE.  Even though the UAE is much, MUCH smaller than Canada I feel like I've accomplished something.  Now I just need to hit up Manitoba and Saskatchewan to say that I've been to all 10 Canadian provinces!  :)

Souk 'til you drop

Wayyy back in October it was "Islamic New Year" and we had a 3 day weekend.  John and I decided to take the metro to Dubai Creek to visit some of the souks.  A souk is a market or bazaar - and you can spend hours inside of them wandering around and admiring the lovely items.  However, be prepared to be harassed by the shop keepers... they will drape pashminas over you as you walk by, calling out to you in multiple languages hoping that you'll respond and walk into their shop to buy something!  John got called "Hey Jack Sparrow" a few times and I received several calls of "Hey Shakira, you want a pashmina?" All you can do is laugh it off, avoid eye contact, and keep on walking!

Anyway, unfortunately for us we do not live on a metro line.  The closest metro stop to us is around 11 km away, but you can do a "park and ride" there.  The Dubai Metro is the world's longest fully automated (no drivers!) metro system in the world.  There are plans to expand the metro closer to us but that probably won't happen for another few years.  It's too bad because riding the metro is fairly cheap, clean, and less stressful than driving around on these hectic roads!

The reason we took the metro down to the souks was because it is generally very crowded down there and hard to find a parking spot.  On our afternoon we visited 3 souks - the "Old Souk" (textile souk), spice souk, and gold souk.  We had previously been to the textile souk when we first visited Dubai several years ago with our friend Greg.  It was time we headed back for a visit!

At the Old Textile Souk there are plenty of lovely pashminas and other Arabian trinkets but I was on the lookout for pillow cushions.  At the souk you need to barter hard.  It's like a game... every time you walk away the price drops!  Keep going back until you get the price you want to pay!  It's mentally tiring and after having dealt with it every time I went shopping in Vietnam, I wasn't really in a mood to barter in Dubai, so I didn't buy much.  I just wanted the experience of being in the souk and wandering around.  At the Old Souk, it's like you've gone back in time.  Wooden boats called abras sail across the creek, ferrying people across for 1 AED (around $0.37 CDN).  There are no huge skyscrapers in the area, unlike downtown Dubai.  It doesn't even feel like "the real Dubai."

With my purchases in hand, we left Souk #1 and paid our coins to the boat driver who sailed us across the creek so we could visit Souk #2... the Spice Souk.  This was the first time we had been there, and it will not be the last!  I loved wandering through that place, with the colourful mounds of spices on display outside of store windows, and all kinds of exotic aromas filling the air.  Shop keepers lure you into their doorways with promises to try their unique spices.  It's a really interesting experience!  We ended up getting some sort of incense which smelled really good.  I don't even remember what it was... sandalwood, amber?  We'll have to go back to try some more some day.

After leaving the Spice Souk we walked over to Souk #3, the Gold Souk.  I had absolutely no intentions of buying anything there - I'm not a rich Emirati!  The store windows were crammed with displays of gold bangles, gold necklaces, gold earrings... gold, gold, gold!  It seemed like most of the people at this souk were tourists just looking to take some photos here like us.  After a short time, we left and crossed back over the creek on an abra to have some lunch.

Our lunch spot was a traditional Arabic-looking place with a patio over the creek.  It was called Bayt Al Wakeel, and it was really good.  The prices were reasonable and it was nice to sit there watching the abra boats.  We ate falafel, fattoush, and had lemon mint juice which is very popular here.  It was a great way to end an interesting afternoon at the creek!