Recommendations for extra days in Warsaw and Prague
My husband and I will be on this tour beginning August 18, 2018. We are planning to arrive two days early in Warsaw and stay two days in Prague after the tour ends. Does anyone have recommendations for things to do in Warsaw and Prague and/or day trips from the two cities?
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While there is a lot to see in Prague like Ed says, you could also hire a guide and driver for a day trip to Český Krumlov, a Unesco World Heritage site about 2.5 hours south of Prague.
AlanS, you wrote:
While there is a lot to see in Prague like Ed says, you could also hire a guide and driver for a day trip to Český Krumlov, a Unesco World Heritage site about 2.5 hours south of Prague.
Do you have any recommendations for a guide and driver for a day trip to Cesky Krumlov?
Thanks.
We are on the 12 April Blue Danube. Several months ago we booked a day trip from Prague to Cesky Krumlov through PragueWalker. I just made our* final payment (*for a group of 7- my harem : ) ).
I got their name from this forum. We leave early, 7:00 am, so we can be back in time for the Welcome Dinner- their typical Cesky Krumlov tour is 10 hrs (hotel) door to door. PW was super easy to deal with, excellent English. They offer fixed and custom tours and are highly recommended by TripAdvisor and Rick Steves. So we will see. I'll post a review on the Blue Danube forum when we get back. Their website http://www.praguewalker.com/ tells all about the company and their tours. It also includes photos and bios of their guides - read a few, you'll be impressed. Tereza will be our guide. If you go with them, tell them I sent you : )
We are on the 12 April Blue Danube. Several months ago we booked a day trip from Prague to Cesky Krumlov through PragueWalker. I just made our* final payment (*for a group of 7- my harem : ) ).
I got their name from this forum. We leave early, 7:00 am, so we can be back in time for the Welcome Dinner- their typical Cesky Krumlov tour is 10 hrs (hotel) door to door. PW was super easy to deal with, excellent English. They offer fixed and custom tours and are highly recommended by TripAdvisor and Rick Steves. So we will see. I'll post a review on the Blue Danube forum when we get back. Their website http://www.praguewalker.com/ tells all about the company and their tours. It also includes photos and bios of their guides - read a few, you'll be impressed. Tereza will be our guide. If you go with them, tell them I sent you : )
Alan, I couldn't find your review of Prague Walker on the Danube forum so please share with me your review of the day trip you and "your harem" took to Cesky Krumlov through Prague Walker. Would you recommend this group? Did you go on the fixed tour or did you customize your tour? Would you change anything about what you saw and/or did? My husband and I are on the Aug. 18th Warsaw, Budapest, Vienna, and Prague tour and are seriously considering booking the Prague Walker day trip to Cesky Krumlow. I look forward to hearing from you. Thanks so much.
Ruby H.
I guess I never wrote a full review, but here are a few post-trip comments:
Post #13:
https://www.tauck.com/yaf/default.aspx?g=posts&m=43438#post43438
Post #8:
https://www.tauck.com/yaf/default.aspx?g=posts&m=43612#post43612
First, booking was professional and extremely easy via email- office manager Marketa was super. Owner Katka would sometimes offer suggestions, e.g. leaving a 7:00 am to maximize our time there because we wanted to be back for welcome dinner. Payment was via Paypal. I paid 1 - 2 months out but payment that early was not necessary.
Most of the way was on smooth, well-maintained, but unfortunately two-lane roads. Due to driving distance, possible traffic, and limited opportunities to pass- we got stuck for awhile behind two log trucks- they allow 2 -1/2 to 3 hrs to get there. With our group of six ladies and me chatting, the drive went fairly quickly. All but two had been on one or more Tauck tours together so we knew each other. This was a modified (customized)/standard tour- PW will work with you to do whatever you want. We paid a bit extra for a larger (very nice) Mercedes van due to our group of 7.
The tour started at the top of castle hill - a convenient, but almost hidden access point. We actually arrived about the same time as a Tauck bus from the Westbound Blue Danube (they drove up from Linz)- they were long gone by the time we left to return to Prague. That matches what a Tauck TD friend (who used to work the Blue Danube tour) told me months earlier- when I told her our proposed schedule- she said we would be spending more time in Český Krumlov than Tauck does.
We walked through the gardens which were not yet in bloom across the gorge bridge, into the upper castle. We stopped for photo ops then our PragueWalker guide took our money and purchased castle tour tickets (additional cost). We took the 1 hr. castle tour with castle guide. I had seen the Rick Steves show where he visited the castle theater. I don't know if we would have had time to take that separate tour, but it wasn't open yet (opens 1 May). After the tour we met up again with Tereza and continued through the castle then across the wooden footbridge into town. Our guide provided commentary the entire time. We stopped for photo ops at various points. A couple of the ladies wanted to visit a colored pencil/crayon store (?) which we did but really didn't have much time for shopping. There was much more to see but time went quickly and before we knew it, it was time to leave- with the drive each way and 1 hr castle tour we only had about 3 hours to tour the town. Even though breakfast at the hotel opened at 6:30, before leaving the US, I had arranged via email with the front desk for box breakfasts, which luckily (or intentionally?) turned out to be boxed lunches. We did not eat in town- didn't want to spend time away from touring.
Our guide Tereza was wonderful- if you go to the PW website I believe you can read short bios of each PW guide- all are pretty impressive. Anyway, I highly recommend them!
Personally (my wife might not agree), I would have liked to have arrived a day earlier and spent the night and part of the next day in Český Krumlov! I really like castles and old stuff and there is just too much to see for one down and back day. Check out the Český Krumlov (State) website- there is an English version- and read about the castle and town. It really is a photogenic town.
View from the Upper Castle- the Vltava river (same one that flows through Prague) separates the castle (lower castle, original "Hradek" castle (and tower) visible here) on the left from the town of Český Krumlov:
I challenge anyone who has not been there to locate the castle "loo" : )
Me and my harem : )
A small gorge separates parts of the castle- the upper bridge contains a special passageway used by the king and others. The entire corridor complex, under the Krumlov Castle roofs and the roofs of contiguous houses, has been mostly preserved up to the present and is nearly a kilometer long. It connects with a nearby monastery and convent.
The view from town:
Ruby
We live in (little) Washington, NC (moved here from N.VA in '04.) We usually fly Delta out of RDU though it is a 2 hr drive from Washington. We flew out of New Bern (40 min. drive) on the way to England, Scotland, Wales several years ago, but for the last few years the fares from New Bern have been much higher, more than the cost of flying out of RDU plus the cost of parking there for two weeks, and layovers in Atlanta for the return flight to New Bern can sometimes be up to 7 hrs!!! We are looking at flying out of New Bern to Botswana next year if the fares hold for another month or so- I just checked tonight for constructive dates and it is not looking good, however. I might need to go back to my original plan- drive to Dulles and fly Ethiopian AL.