Prague, Slovakia, Budapest, Milan
The last few weeks have been a bit of a whirl of movement, with limited time for reflection, or at least for tapping reflections into a computer.
I won't inflict a pedestrian recitation of each step of the way on you though!
Well, okay, maybe a bit...
In short, after leaving Germany, I was reunited with Niamh in Prague after a long day of train travel, after a missed connection then another connection delayed by over two hours. We spent a few days there, got a sleeper train to Poprad in northern Slovakia and spent a lovely half week couch-surfing with a lovely local family, walking in the Slovenský raj (Slovak Paradise), a well-named region of hilly forest to the south and an overnight walk in the Vysoké Tatry (High Tatras), spectacular mountains that form the border with Poland (read more about that visit here).
From there we spent a day travelling to Budapest, where we spent a rainy couple of days, and I caught up with a mate from Central Australia, then a luxurious sleeper to Milan, where we caught up with one of the few Irish-speaking Italians, who we met in Donegal at the language course.
There we couch-surfed with a good-hearted and eccentric host who made his place open to any comers, which meant that on both nights there were eight guests crowded in his small apartment's living room - we slept on the balcony!
We spent a nice day at Como - and walking above it - then the next day headed off to Switzerland.
A few photos of that fortnight###
I thought Prague was full of tourists when I went there in 1992, but nothing can really prepare you for the hordes of people in the city centre now. Nevertheless, it is a lovely city, and turned on lovely weather for us too!
We climbed over that range, just to the left of that little peak in the saddle in the middle, in what was at times a fairly demanding venture!