Saturday in the Woods

Saturday morning arrived a little later than usual for us as we slept until 6:00 AM. Liz started the coffee and after it had time to brew I ventured out of bed and read news on the computer. I was surprised that the $700 billion bailout was now a done deal. American politics seem somewhat remote to us unless we are watching CNN or BBC. Both cover the US political scene quite thoroughly. Rachel got up about 8:00 AM. It was then that we started house cleaning in earnest. We vacuumed, cleaned the bathroom, the kitchen, the trash cans, the washing machine (why you ask – everything is just a bit different here is all I can say). We picked up, straightened up, tidied up and then Liz made eggs and toast for us. We made short work of this meal.

It was after 10:00 by this time so we then began scurrying to be ready to leave home by 10:30 for our day’s adventure. To keep life interesting and to keep our spirits lifted we are trying to have one adventure each weekend. We have been traveling out of Prague to smaller places the last few weeks – but today we were off to a different type of adventure. We packed lunches and drinks in our back packs, stuffed snacks, hats and jackets in also. The day’s temperature was forecast to be in the fifties only today with some clouds and perhaps a chance of rain later in the afternoon.

We left the apartment, walked to the nearby metro stop and then rode the metro to the Hlavni Nadrazi train station. There we met up with sixteen people from the International Baptist Church of Prague. We were going together on a seven km trek through the hills and meadows outside of Prague. We were to be led by a Czech gentleman named Karel who attends the English speaking service.




John and Karel on the train as we travel to our woodland destination. The group from IBCP.

We boarded the train and set out for a fifteen or twenty minute ride together to the west and disembarked at a small town on the outskirts of Prague. We set off together walking through the streets until we crossed the highway and entered a more pristine world of beauty and quietness. Our trekkers ranged from nine year old Seoyung, one of three in a Korean family to Liz and I. Karel was probably about our age, but you never know. His daughter Anna went along and she was in her twenties. A family that was half-Czech and half-Ethiopian also went. They are extraordinarily interesting family that has started a ministry to northern Ethiopia. They are actually our neighbors – living on our block. Also the pastor of the church and his wife were also participants as well as an IMB couple from Kentucky. Another interesting participant was Julia – who comes from a Romanian immigrant to Denmark. She is working in Prague at Skoda – the nation’s leading car manufacturer. They make some very nice looking cars and are a subsidiary of VW. Our friend Leah, a Canadian who also teaches at CISP, also went along.

Our trek started out with a kilometer or so of fairly steep uphill. We got thoroughly warmed up on this part of the walk. From time to time we would meet others on the trail either passing our slower moving group or coming from the opposite direction. We started out in deciduous trees and then suddenly we entered a region of evergreens. The land finally flattened out and occasionally we came to a meadow or an to a lovely view of the river valley to our west. The last The group on the trail (left). The four of us from CISP (right)

third of the trek was a downhill portion through forested hills. It was made exceptionally scenic because the forest on the hillside is carefully tended and trees are cut so that there is a spacing of ten to twelve feet between each tree. Hence you can see into and through the forest and grass grows under the trees. I have never seen such a large expanse of trees managed in this way. It is more like someone’s backyard than a US forest.

We eventually reached the end of the trail and headed home on a train. Our group of nineteen just barely made it on the train as it stopped at this little town for about forty-five seconds only. We all hustled on and before we were seated the train was in motion. Public transport is just unbelievably efficient and cheap here. We paid a about fifty cents each to take the two short train rides out of Prague.

We would normally have taken the metro home but it is a circuitous route and a change of lines. However I asked the Ethiopian family how they were getting home. They said that they would walk. I asked them if we could get a tram home from the railway station rather than and they said we could get on our 9 tram at the railway station and get home easily. So we followed them so they could show us the tram stop. However, we were having such a good time talking with them we decided to walk home with them. I think it took us about fifteen minutes or so. It helps to have people who live here tell us how to get around as we would probably have continued taking the metro. I think the tram will be a much faster way to get to the train station and we will use that from now on. We had no idea that the train station is so close to where we live because we have always taken the metro there before.

We got home to a clean house and found the internet down again. We have been having a lot of internet problems the last three weeks. The Internet is back up so I will try and get this off before it goes down again.