Four day trip - From Brno, Czech Republic to Krakow, Poland

Finally "my" vacation was here. My hubby has been way too busy to take a chunk of days off, so we took an advantage of Czech holiday on Sept 28th (called Den české státnosti, I suppose) and took a day off on Monday the 27th and made it into a four day vacation.  I know he was busy, so I do appreciate his effort to make me happy (thanks hon!) :)

There were a couple of places that I wanted to visit on the way to and from Krakow, such as Hukvaldy where Janacek was born and Auschwitz.  I made the following itinerary just for fun. And, of course the challenge was "gG," our beloved cat/son.  We can't really leave him in a car for a long time, so we needed to make a plan to avoid such instances.
9/25 (Sat): Leave Brno --- (43m) ---> Kromeriz --- (2hr 45m) ---> Kobior, Poland
9/26 (Sun): Kobior, Poland --- (35m) ---> Oswiecim/Auschwitz --- (35m) ---> Kobior, Poland --- (1hr 10m) ---> Krakow
9/27 (Mon): Krakow
9/28 (Tue): Krakow --- (2hr 30m) ---> Hukvaldy --- (1hr 48m) ---> Brno

We always enjoy our short trips like this, but I made a mistake in planning this time. Firstly Kromeriz was much bigger than I expected.  Much more stuff to see.  Consequently, we gave up on taking a tour of Archibishop's Chateau, etc, and we just walked through a part of the vast garden behind the chateau. It was a nice walk with nice scenary, and we told ourselves that we had to visit there again some other time (without gG).

Secondly, the car navigation system we got from Hertz didn't work at all.  It almost got us lost, and it took much longer time to get from one place to another. For instance, you should be able to get to Hukvaldy from Krakow in 2 hrs and 30 mins, but instead it took us like 4 hrs!  Anyway, I managed to accomplish my dream visit to Janacek's second house, so I can't complain.

Thirdly, I underestimated the time we could spend in Auschwitz. You could definitely spend all day long there.

But, all in all, the vacation was fantastic. I will be posting about each place after this.  Hope you get a glimpse of what we experienced throughout the trip.

New black granite attraction at Náměstí Svobody

For a while we knew that something was being built under the huge tent-like cover at the corner of Náměstí Svobody. It was finally unveiled over the weekend.

It was a black machine looking like a small spaceship! According to the press, it is a clock made out of black granite, and it spits out (don't know how) a glass marble everyday at 11am (this 11am is related to the legend mentioned in my previous post).

I walked by it twice already this week, and at both time, the granite clock was surrounded by many Brno folks. And especially today, since it was around 10:45am when I walked by it, people were clinging around the clock being so eager to catch a ball which supposedly should come out from one of the holes of the clock at 11am. I heard you can take it home if you were lucky enough to catch the ball.  I shall stay and watch how the ball looks like next time!

Burčák at Vinná Galerie

I didn't know about "Burčák" until our Czech teacher mentioned it to us the other day. Then my hubby found it at a wine bar/cellar called "Vinná Galerie" near his office. So, off we went yesterday after work.

Once you step inside the bar/cellar through the wide wooden door, you see a softly sloping corridor surrounded by brick walls going down to the underground bar/cellar. The cellar expands beneath arched brick ceilings, with three huge tables displaying all kinds of wines in the middle. There is some seating along the side walls. We got there rather early, and we managed to get a seat by the window. The decor is perfectly suited to wine lovers. Something about the atomosphere relaxed me completely.

We ordered two glasses of wine as they were out of Burčák when we got there. The store clerk told us they would be getting a new barrel soon, so we sat by the window and enojyed the Moravian white wine while waiting for the Burčák.

Then it came!! A guy brought down two huge containers of Burčák. We got the first ladle of Burčák. It was like a very thick purplish apple juice. My hubby, who had drunk Burčák the previous night at the same place, told me it tasted different from the one he had. Indeed, I think it was thicker as we got the first glass out of the newly brought in barrel. The second glass (yep, I had a second glass of Burčák!) was much smoother and had a murky honey-like cream color. I also noticed a distinctive smell the second time which I didn't notice from the first glass. It actually reminded me of the smell of the stuff you apply when you get your hair permed :-)

Burčák is fermented young wine, or pre-wine sweet drink with 4 to 8% of alcohol. It is only available around this time of the year (it seems that it can be only sold from Aug 1 till Nov 30 by law), after the first grapes have been crushed. Burčák has a short life. It is said that it should be tasted rather quickly. I also heard that the alcohol content goes up as you leave it in the bottle and that it could give you a major headache if you drink 3-day old Burčák.

Moravians seem to have an especially strong bond to Burčák and seem to believe that you can't expect to be healthy unless you drink at least seven litres of the young wine each year! Indeed, it seems that Burčák is rich in Vitamin B and minerals.  And, there were lots of housewives and hubbies, often with cute little kiddies in tow, coming to the store with their own empty bottles to take Burčák back home. The store also sells the empty bottles, and we treated ourselves to a small 1-litter bottle of Burčák to take back home. It cost only 30 CZK (approx. $1.50)!