Day 28

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Today we took a day trip to Dresden. We left really early so we could get the most of our day. We boarded the train at about 7:30 a.m. It was the nicest train we had been in so far, and the four of us had our own compartment so we were able to stretch out and sleep and all that.

We arrived at about 10:00. Rachel was so excited to get there, Germany was one of the places she wanted to go to before she dies. Also, we got our passports stamped, so now we look like quite the world travellers. At the end of the trip, I will have 10 stamps on my passport (of course, 6 of them are from the Czech Republic, but whatever).

Anyway, when we got there we walked through a nice shopping center in order to get to the city center. Everything to see in the city is basically in a straight line from the train station to a place across the bridge. The plan was to look at everything on our way over, and then decide what we wanted to see and go inside on the way back. The city center had lots of very old buildings, but that buildings were not as kept up as they were in Vienna. Apparently Dresden was heavily destroyed during World War II.

One of the nicest buildings we saw was Fraenkirsche. This was an old Protestant church. It was very heavily destroyed druing World War II. The communists decided not to fix it but rather to keep it as a reminder of the war. It was finally renovated and opened up for visitors this year to celebrate the city's 800th anniversary.

We saw more buildings in the old part of town and then crossed the bridge to the new part of town. There really wasn't much there, a few museums that we didn't find and some fountains and things like that. We had lunch over there (bratwurst). Almost right after lunch, we had reached the end of the line of sights, so we headed back.

It had been raining steadily for most of the day. Three of us had umbrellas but we were still getting wet. At some point it was raining so hard that the umbrellas didn't help a whole lot (it wasn't as hard as it was raining in Terezin but still pretty hard). We went back to Fraenkircshe to see if we could go in but it was closed. We decided to make our way back to the train station to catch an earlier train home. We saw a few new things on the way, stopped at a cafe, and stopped at a pretzel shop.

We got to the train station and did not see our train departure time. We asked someone who told us that the train station was under construction so fewer trains stop at this station, and that our train would be coming in at the other Dresden station. We ran to catch a bus (which was a little hard to find) to the other station, and got on our train back to Prague. The train ride took about an hour longer than planned, and I think we were all sick of travelling by the time the day was over.

I'm glad I got to go to Germany but it was a shame that the weather was not cooperating.

Oh, there are some more facebook albums up, two from Germany and one from two days in Prague. Here's the link:

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Photos

Dresden
Perfectly dry after arrival.

Fraenkirsche
Wind + Cheap umbrellas = bad

Drying off
Drying off in a cafe.

Comments

[Dad]

Too Bad
It was too bad about the weather in Dresden. It sounds like you girls had some fun though. Thank goodness you found out about the train in plenty of time to get to the other station. Oh, just so you know, Maxine made it to St. Louis but her sutcase didn't. Hopefully it will be waiting for her at the airport before she boards MoEx in the morning. Love you! -----Dad

[Grandma Rediger]

Last Day!
Hope you bring some of that rain home to Missouri. We are really needing rain. Looks like you girls had a good time in Germany. Too bad that Maxine had a problem with her luggage. Have a safe trip home and call us when you are back in St. Louis. We loved reading all your Blogs!! Lots of love, Grandma R.