Here you can browse through my blog posts prior to February 2022. Currently I'm sharing my travel experiences, candid opinions, and what's on my mind solely on my Facebook page. — Rick
Any time I visit Prague, a highlight for me is to drop by the castle’s front door and see Josef and his Prague Castle Orchestra playing — and, hopefully, hear Smetana’s Die Moldau (as we have in this clip). If I were the mayor of Prague, I’d book them for the rest of their musical days to bring joy to city’s many visitors, as they do here, at the gateway to its most visited sight. Josef is one of those creative people who has clearly found his niche.
If you can’t see the video below, watch it on YouTube.
Prague is a traveler’s dream city: exotic but easy, affordable, boasting arguably Europe’s best beer, and an architectural time warp with plenty of great sightseeing. It’s crowded and touristy — precisely because it’s so much fun. Here are a few of my favorite memories from my latest trip.
Charles Bridge is a 500-yard stroll over the Vltava River, connecting what many consider Europe’s largest castle with a thriving Old Town. Any time of day or night, the stroll comes with fun street music and great people-watching.The great Czech painter Alfons Mucha’s magnum opus, the Slav Epic, is finally settled in Prague, where it should be. Its 20 massive canvases connect the Czech people with their Slavic soul. It’s one of the most powerful artistic experiences in Europe — don’t miss it.Prague’s Lennon Wall spontaneously appeared back in Cold War times, when the Czech people were birds locked in a cage and needed a place to vent. They’d paint murals of John Lennon each night, only to have them whitewashed over by the authorities the next day. Today the poignancy of the wall is long gone, but it’s still a colorful and nostalgic place to visit.Prague is one city where, more than just about anywhere else, I recommend hiring a private guide — like Sarka, whom I’ve recommended in my Prague book since its first edition nearly a decade ago. For about $30 an hour, you get a guide and companion who is expert at making your wandering meaningful.One of my favorite things lately is meeting families on the road whose parents are making the travel experience fun and enlightening for the kids. This mom is a super guide — she’s with her kids in what could be just another old church…but look at the enthusiasm in her little travelers’ faces. (I like to think the guidebook they’re toting helps, too.)
When I was a kid, I grew a beard each summer. It just seemed to fit being on the road. Since I started my TV series, I’ve kept my look more basic and clean-shaven. Now that I no longer travel with a Youth Rail pass, my beard is gray. (I can dream of someday, perhaps, looking like “the most interesting man in the world.”) Having a beard doesn’t really give me anonymity in my travels — but that’s not the point. (I enjoy my lack of anonymity.) It’s just fun to grow it on the road. I’m about to meet my film crew in France, so it’s time to say Auf Wiedersehen to my beard. Thanks for all the (generally encouraging) comments on my summer growth.
Which do you prefer? To beard or not to beard?
In my younger days, growing a beard on my annual European trips was low-maintenance…and, I like to think, ruggedly handsome.
Today, my whiskers are whiter and more carefully cultivated…but still practical and rugged.
The nice thing about growing a beard is that shaving your whiskers also shaves off a decade.
My television viewers have gotten accustomed to the clean-shaven look. So when we bring out the camera, I also bring out my razor.
In early 1945, as Allied armies advanced on Berlin and Nazi Germany lay in ruins, Hitler and his staff retreated to a bunker complex behind the former Reich Chancellery. He stayed there for two months. It was here that, as the Soviet army tightened its noose on the capital, Hitler and Eva Braun, his wife of less than 48 hours, committed suicide on April 30, 1945. A week later, the war in Europe was over. There’s nothing here except for a simple info board with a detailed cutaway illustration of the bunker complex plus a timeline tracing its history and ultimate fate.
If you can’t see the video below, watch it on YouTube.
This is an essential stop for any visit to Berlin. It’s been criticized for focusing on just one of the groups targeted by the Nazis, but the German government has now erected memorials to other victims. It’s also criticized because there’s nothing Jewish about it. Some were struck that there’s no central gathering point…no place for a ceremony. Like death, you enter it alone. There is no intended meaning. Is it a labyrinth…a symbolic cemetery…and intentionally disorienting? It’s entirely up to the visitor to derive the meaning, while pondering this horrible chapter in human history. What was your reaction to this memorial?
If you can’t see the video below, watch it on YouTube.
