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This is the story about our three week trip to Prague and Cesky Krumlov in the Czech Republic; Siena and the Cinque Terre in Italy, and the West Country of England.

Czech Republic, Siena, Cinque Terre-October 1997.

Jvi
2004-09-14 10:54:29

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On October 15, 1997, Christine and I left Chicago's O'Hare Airport on a British Airways Flight bound for London. The flight was not full so I moved across the aisle giving Christine three seats and I had two. Given the extremely small area that BA gives you, this allowed us to catch some sleep on the flight. We arrived at Heathrow on time and caught the bus from Terminal 4 to Terminal 3. It isn't hard, you just follow the overhead signs to "Transfers". You have to walk at Heathrow but after a trans-Atlantic flight, it feels good. At Terminal 3 we had a few hours to kill so we walked around some more and then sat down for some coffee. The flight to the Czech Republic was uneventful but our first views of the Czech Republic as we approached the Prague airport showed us several small villages, farms and then a couple of large pipelines that criss-crossed the countryside. There are a lot of big pipelines above ground in the Czech Republic. A car met the plane on the runway and the plane followed it to gate NUMBER ONE. This was a very bad omen as "Vittoe's Rule #1" states that our plane will always dock at the gate furthest from the terminal.

The Prague airport was a little strange as arriving passengers and departing passengers were mingled together. This is contrary to most international airports where international passengers are segregated and ushered directly through immigration and customs. Because of this we passed by many of the shops that are in the departing lounges. We also passed many places to change money; don't change your money at these places. We skipped them all even though we didn't have any Czech money. Leaving through the Customs Green Door, we noticed several cash machines on our left. We immediately went to one and withdrew about 12,000 Czech Kronas (our rate was 32.4 kronas to the dollar but you don't know what the rate is until you get home and see your bank statement. Then we went to the Information ...