Prague, Krosno, and Gdansk

Sorry it has been so long, but this week has been crazy. On Sunday night we got back to Krakow from Prague, which was great! The city was gorgeous and it was fairly easy to navigate. We had a little trouble when we first got there because the taxi driver wanted to charge us 2000 crowns to take us to our hostel. There's 20 crowns to a dollar, so he wanted $100! We didn't let that fly, and I was getting out of the car when we got the guy to come down to 800 crowns, or $40, which was still a little expensive, but not as bad as before. We were just tired and wanted to get to our hostel. Then it was interesting because the guy couldn't find the hostel. After about 20 minutes of driving around and him stopping to ask people for directions and still getting lost, I was starting to worry that the hostel didn't even exist and I had gotten ripped off and we had no place to stay. But, we finally found it, so all was well. The hostel was.....quaint.....to put it nicely. To say the least, it wasn't the Four Seasons. But, it was cheap and it gave us a place to sleep and an experience that we'll never forget. The next day, we got up early and took the metro to Hradcany to see Prague Castle. It was HUGE! At 620 meters long and 150 meters wide, it is the largest medieval castle in the world. We took a tour, and we got to see the room in which the defenestration of Prague took place, so that was interesting. The defenestration occurred during the religious revolutions of the 1500s and the Protestants were trying to set up their own government and holed up in the castle. When the Catholic nobles and the army came in to try to get them to leave, the Protestants threw the Catholic nobles out of the window. However, much to their chagrin, the nobles survived.
We also went to the Royal Gardens which were absolutely beautiful. I don't think I have seen anything so green and so many different kinds of flowers in my life. At the very end of the gardens was the Royal Summer Palace. It looked a lot like an old southern plantation style home, except bigger.
The rest of the time, we mainly just ran around the city, did a lot of shopping, and hung out in the Old Town Square. It was pretty interesting, though, because on one day, I saw 6 couples that had just gotten married. It was crazy! There was one couple that was walking down one of the side streets and they were still dressed in their tux and gown, and she had her bouquet. It was really cute and would've been a great picture, but I couldn't get to my camera fast enough. :-(
When we got back to Krakow, we had Monday that was pretty much free, and then on Tuesday after class, we left for Krosno, which is a smaller town about 3 hours east of Krakow. We went there for an overnight with the Polish students at the university there. They are studying to teach English, so it was a fun experience. They were all very nice and great hosts. This is a fairly poor country, and as I understood it, these students had been saving up for most of the year to be able to take us all to a pub for pizza and beer!
We got back from Krosno on Wednesday, had class on Thursday, and then we left at 5:30 am on Friday morning for Gdansk and Sopot. We got to Malbork to see the Teutonic castle there at about 5:00 pm that day, and it was really interesting, but we were all tired, so it probably wasn't as good of a tour as it could've been. We finally got to our hotel in Gdynia, which is Gdansk's sister city, and got a much needed good night's sleep. The next morning, we got on the bus and took a tour of Sopot. We went through the city which was beautiful. I think Sopot and Gdansk are my favorite cities in Europe so far. We got to see the pier at Sopot on the Baltic Sea, which is the longest pier in the world, and at the end of the pier, there is a pole on which you are supposed to make a wish. I'll never tell what I wished....:)
That night, we had a birthday party and bonfire on the beach for James, one of the guys in our group. He turned 21. It was really fun because we sang the War Hymn at midnight and got to soak our feet in the Baltic. I don't know when I'll ever get to say that again! I don't know too many Aggies who can say that they got to sing the War Hymn on the Baltic.
The next morning we went to Westerplatte where the first shots of WWII were fired. It was really interesting to see the old T-34 Stalin tank that was there. We all climbed up onto it and gave a big WHOOP! After that, we got back on the bus and headed back to Krakow. It was a LONG ride. We got stuck in traffic several times. We left at 2:30 pm and we didn't get back to Krakow until nearly 3:00 am. It was rough, but we finally made it back and I went immediately to sleep. Trying to sleep on a bus is not so fun. But anyway, that was my crazy week, so I hope everybody enjoys reading about it!