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What are your recommendations for touring Cesky Krumlov from Prague at the end of the tour?
My husband and I are signed up for the Warsaw, Budapest, Vienna & Prague tour in September and plan to spend an additional day on our own to go to Cesky Krumlov. I have read about the company PragueWalker but would like to know if others have used this company and recommend it or recommend another company for this day trip? Also, would you hire a guide in addition to a driver? We want to tour the castle and the baroque theater and plan to buy tickets for that so a guide would not be needed for that part of the day.
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Did you have to cancel your August 2018 trip?
In your prep for that one, you read my my old post(s) so you know we used PragueWalker in April 2018 for a tour of the Jewish Quarter in Prague and for an all day trip to Cesky Krumlov. Here is a link to my posts and review: https://forums.tauck.com/discussion/comment/43989#Comment_43989 The four of us who did the city tour and the gaggle of seven who went to Cesky Krumlov had nothing but praise for our guide (Tereza), van, driver, etc. from PragueWalker. As I said in my old post, we learned about them from another Tauck traveler, but I was also reading an archived post where someone else had used them more recently- also very pleased. Unfortunately, I haven't fully mastered the new search function so have only been able to find my posts. I'll be happy to answer additional questions, but, in addition to the excellent guide (for both) they were more than willing to work with me on the details and to customize our tour.. They were really good communicating.
Even if it is just the two of you, I think it is best to have separate driver and guide. PragueWalker can help you decide, but parking there isn't the best so you would be wasting a lot of time doing that when you could be dropped off and already touring with your guide. We had a similar decision to make. The only time we had a driver only was during Classic Italy when we went to Pisa from Florence one free afternoon.
AlanS, what did you do to customize your Cesky Krumlov day trip?
Since we wanted to be back for the Tauck welcome*, at their suggestion, we left earlier than usual, at 7:00 (we also arranged for a boxed breakfast/snack through the hotel since we departed before breakfast opened.) After touring the castle (tours are at fixed times), we had time for lunch and a short tour of the town. Since there were shops some members of our group wanted to see specifically, we skipped lunch so we could spend more time in town. We had one more person than the usual, and though we still could have all "fit" in their small van, we opted for a larger one. I had hoped we would have time to tour the baroque theater (see Rick Steves' video) but learned from PragueWalker a month or so earlier, it hadn't opened for the season yet. These are just small items, but PW was basically willing to do what ever we wanted. FYI, when we arrived at the castle drop-off there were a bunch of people who had just gotten off a bus with one of those green compass rose signs (a group from the westbound Blue Danube ship)
They departed long before we departed.
*We had a constraint that you won't have, but just be aware it is a significant drive from Prague to Cesky Krumlov so can take quite awhile on the two lane road, especially if you get stuck behind a log truck like we did for a stretch. You'll spend a bunch of your tour time on the road. If you had planned much earlier, another option since you are doing this post-cruise, would have been to go to CK one day, hire a local guide, spend the night there, then head back to Prague the next day.
AlanS, thanks for sharing with me. In regard to our August 2018 trip, we arrived two days early, and on Aug. 18, the day that the tour began (at 6 p.m.), I experienced a very bad and very serious fall in the early afternoon in a cathedral in Old Town Warsaw. I was hospitalized for 4 days until we could get arrangements worked out for me to be flown back to the US, where I had surgery and spent 6 months recuperating. So, my husband and I are hoping to get to enjoy this tour in September. I appreciate all of your helpful advice.
HI Alan and Hunt 'N Fun - we booked with Prague Walker (thanks to Alan) to visit Kutna Hora -- but we're a week behind you Hunt N Fun as we begin inWarsaw on 9/21. Will we miss you? I think you're a Tar Heel too?
Mazalea, our tour begins in Warsaw on Sept. 11. Yes, I am a "Tar Heel", too--live in the Piedmont region of NC.
Get outta here!
AlanS in "Little" Washington. (Yankees by birth, so as the locals say, we are "not from here"
)
What a fun crowd we are! We should have a meet up here in Raleigh to compare notes and trade stories. Course, with all these heavy travelers, it might be tough to schedule -- but no airplanes or terminals for us to navigate. We'll be happy following you on this Warsaw trip-- I'm deciding which shoes to pack right now. Have a grand, and safe, experience. Alan, is there a way we can all converse privately off this site??
On the site via the messaging feature (envelope at upper right of the screen), often called "private messaging" (PM) on other websites. Up to 50 people can participate. Click on the envelope, select "new message" and then just type a few letters from the screen name of the intended "recipient." The software then lists likely matches to select from. In the msg I just sent (look for the alert- red mark on the envelope) all I needed to type was "maz" and "hunt" in the recipient box.
Off the site there is email. The actual PM I sent includes my last name and email address. The only people who can see and have access to the PM are the originator and "recipients."