Adventures in 2017

Many moons ago a couple in my cycling club went off on an adventure fulfilling a dream to sail the world. A fantastic looking photo was shown to me, and I asked where is this place ?  Montenegró was the response. Oh, that looks interesting I said. Little did I realise that that comment became a catalyst to a real visit. Both Caroline and I enjoyed the visit very much.

My alarm was set for 5:30am, it is going to be a big day.  I am off for a 3 1/2 hour drive to the Tara Canyon for an  " One day high rafting adventure " hosted by a company called the Waterfall rafting center.  I had driver and was the only passenger for this trip. Caroline not keen on the idea of rafting elected to spend the day in Kotor.

Montenegro is a small nation tucked down on the southern border of Croatia, we visited it directly after landing at Dubrovnik from Prague.

A fine day for cycling I think. May I use a bike, I wish to ride to Plzen, I say to the staff. With enthusiasm they rummaged in the cellars below, found something that would do the job, gave me a map and wished me a good day.  I took my phone loaded with the Maps.Me app, a few bottles of water, roughed out a plan to ride across the river at Liblin follow the road alongside to Plzen, find the famous Pilsner Urquell brewery  and off I trundled.

How cool would it be to stay in one of those mediaeval castles ? We thought so too and so this was the first of two (and as it turns out only one) that we booked and stayed at

Dobrý den! or hello to the Czech countryside and  Čau! (like Italian Ciao! ) or goodbye to Praha or as we English speaking folks call it.

Prague is a small busy city, capital of Czechia. In a nutshell: it's music & culture, good food and fancy old buildings, oh and of course Pilsner beer. It was a good choice to start our trip.

We are off, we being me: Stuart and my wife: Caroline on a seven week jaunt to Eastern Europe, or some would say Central Europe - well who cares - we are visiting Czech Republic, Montenegro, Croatia, Slovenia, Austria and Hungary in that order