Hiking and fire-dancing

Prague's ornate architecture may be stunning, but the woods and countryside in the Czech Republic hold their own quite well, too. We got to see them last weekend when we took a day hike with some former colleagues near the Berounka River and a little town called Černošice, not far out of the city. It felt very Czech, as people literally empty out of metropolitan areas to get active in nature on Saturdays and Sundays.

You just never know what you'll run into in the boondocks...

We did about 12km with this view :) And J-dog walked over half of it!

Stations of the Cross scattered throughout the trees

A bottle of the local apple brew at a pit-stop somewhere in the woods. BW detested it, but it reminded me of my Grandpa R's moonshine he used to make in the basement.

A Czech wedding

Signs pointing to villages and sites along the different routes. There is an extensive network of hiking/cycling trails throughout the country that are color-coded and mapped. It's fantastic.

My lovely former colleagues. Can you guess what subjects they teach?

A boy and his (very) large zucchini, standing at the train station

The same night, another long-time friend, Mon, performed at Naplavka, an area along the river where hundreds of Czechs go every night to hang out on the cobblestones with bottles of wine to watch the sunset, listen to music, and take in the incredible castle views. Mon is the gal on the left, and she's been firedancing as a hobby since 2006. Toasty!

Pheonix-like

We were in awe of this - good thing the river was only 40 feet away!