Visitors from the US of A

Hello all!  I must immediately apologize for my hiatus from writing, I won't let it happen again.  The end of October is upon us and much has happened over in Prague.  I had three wonderful visitors in Prague earlier this month.  Together we thoroughly explored the city and some of its surrounding areas.  We visited the massive Prague castle and complex.  There we saw a previous residence of Kafka, a beautiful cathedral, and great views looking down on the river and the old town.  We ventured just outside of the castle complex to Petrin Hill and up the 299 steps of the "Little Eiffel Tower" from which you can apparently see to Poland.  Other important sites visited were the Communist museum, the Jewish Quarter of Prague, my neighborhood :), Old Town Square, Wenceslas Square, and a large variety of great restaurants and pubs.  We ventured out of the city to Terezin, a stopping off point for many Czech Jews on their way to other concentration camps in Central Europe.  As harrowing and horrible as this place is, I'm so glad I was able to go and experience it.  The town of Terezin isn't much more than a memorial to the horrific events that happened there, but there is still much to see.  The fortress, cemeteries, museums, and barracks tell a story of what happened there many years ago.  I thought the most interesting part was the crematorium through which 180 bodies went each day. I realize that this is minuscule as compared to other camps in Germany and Poland, but it was still shocking to see.  My family and I spent the weekend in a small town in southern Czech Republic not far from the Austrian border called Cesky Krumlov.  This is a beautiful, quaint town settled on the Vltava River (same river as in Prague).  The weather was cold but beautiful and made for a relaxing weekend of site seeing, eating, and poking around little shops.  I was lucky enough to meet up with the crew in Bratislava as they cruised down the river.  It was a great day trip in which we saw the town square, museum, castle, and the Slovakian version on the Space Needle.  I won't lie, as biased as I am, Seattle's is better, but the views were amazing.  I didn't realize how modern and large Bratislava was.  Slovakian pride was obvious everywhere we went; the split from the Czech Republic was quite clear.  There were many similarities (I understood a few Slovakian words that were similar to Czech words) but there were differences as well.  I'm so fortunate to have had visitors from so far away, I hope they enjoyed the adventure!