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Brno, Czech Republic - Hrad Spilberk / Spielberg Castle

More pictures from Brno, Czech republic taken in May. These fotos are of the Hrad Spilberk (Spielberg Castle), located atop the hill of the same name.

Hrad Spilberk / Spielberg Castle - This is the main, inner castle building. You can see part of the moat in front of the building. Behind me are walls that drop around 50 feet, straight down.

Hrad Spilberk / Spielberg Castle - A close-up of the moat.

Hrad Spilberk / Spielberg Castle - an outer castle building.

Hrad Spilberk / Spielberg Castle - Lots of canons around the walls. Spielberg looks like a pretty well-defended fortress.

Brno - Petrov, Saint Peter and Paul Cathedral

Brno is the second largest city in the Czech Republic, with around 370,000 residents. The city is dominated by two hills, the Spilberg and the Petrov. On top of the Petrov sits the Saint Peter and Paul Cathedral.

The cathedral was built in the 13th century, and may incorporate some parts of the Roman-era castle that once stood on the hill.

The cathedral was originally built in Gothic style, but was updated to a Baroque style in the 1700's.

Several of these memorials to catholic bishops surround the cathedral. It has been the seat of the Brno bishopric since 1777.

Petrov - Saint Peter and Paul Cathedral

These stairs lead down to the city center.

The cathedral's current Neo-Gothic style was fashioned at the turn of the 20th century.

Brno, Czech Republic - Capuchin Monastery

I spent a long weekend in Brno, Czech Republic (Brunn to German-speakers) in May. It just so happened that the Czech Republic's national ice hockey team won the world championship that weekend (Playing in Vienna). It was a good time to be in town. Brno is a nice little place where most everything is cheap. The food is good, lodging is easy to find, people are warm and friendly, and there are some nice sites to see.

I'll get some more photos from Brno online this week, but I'll give you these three to start out. These are photos of the Capuchin Monastery and Crypt, in the town center, close to the main rail station.

The church looks pretty plain from the outside.

The crypt underneath is a little more interesting. I believe these are the skeletons of monks who served at the monastery.

This is a masked mummy. Look at the right shoulder and you can see some of the skeleton's bones underneath the elaborate costume.

Beijing (Peking) Hotel Tip

If you're planning to visit China's capital city (Beijing / Peking), and are on a tight budget, or are simply interested in a more authentic experience than luxury 4 and 5 star hotels can offer, you should contact Renny Wei (rennywei@yahoo.com) and make reservations at the Beijing Kai Hua Hotel (aka Beijing Yongdingmen Hotel).

Renny is the super friendy, super helpful manager of the Yongdingmen. He will pick you up at the airport in his private car and set you up with everything you need in order to enjoy beautiful, exotic Beijing. Rates are very reasonable. The rooms are a bit spartan, but the hotel is near the center of the city (Tiananmen Square). There is an authentic (and pretty dirty) Chinese Internet cafe in the hotel - populated 24 hours a day with young Beijing residents playing various online games and chatting.

We spent close to a week in the Yongdingmen hotel. Renny set us up with maps, directions, a crash course in Han Yuan (Mandarin). He will drive you out to a well-maintained, almost tourist-free section of the Great Wall  for a very reasonable price, with an authentic lunch along the way.

Renny will also help you arrange transport out of Beijing. Just tell him where you're headed -- he will drive you to the train station and help you arrange tickets. Renny recommended that we travel 2nd class on the trains. It's cheaper, and you get to mingle with lots of Chinese citizens, who are genuinely happy and intrigued to have foreigners travelling with them (in my experience, anyway).

Budapest Travel Tips

This is the first in a series of posts in which I share with you specific tips and contact information for people and companies I have dealt with personally while travelling. These will be living documents -- I will update them as I learn new, relevant information about each destination.

Tour Guide: Horváth Zoltán (Rinett Guide Bt.)
rinettguide@freemail.hu
(36) 30-996 0826
Rinett Guide - Private Guided Driving Tours, Excursions, Sightseeing Tours in Budapest & Hungary

If you're in Budapest, Hungary, and would like a driving tour of the city or its surroundings, contact Zoltán. Zoltán is Hungarian and speaks excellent English. He works regularly with the Four Seasons Hotel Budapest and drives a Renault van that seats up to six. I can't recommend Zoltán highly enough. It was a real pleasure to be driven around the city by this friendly, knowledgeable tour guide. He took my parents and I to all of the must-see sights in Budapest, and we really enjoyed having the chance to talk with him about Hungarian history, culture and language. Zoltán is a smart guy - he'll give you as much or little information as you'd like, knows his history, and he will tailor a tour to meet your specifications. Rates: ~40 Euros per hour for city tours, and 30-35 Euros per hour for longer tours in the countryside.

Lodging: Private Apartments
(booking center across the street from the Marriott)

Forget staying in expensive hotels or ratty hostels when you visit Budapest. Stay in a private apartment for the best combination of price, comfort, location and experience. I spent a couple of nights in a private apartment right in the center of town. The rooms in this communist-style building were luxuriously furnished (huge four-poster beds, antique furniture), and the proprietors were very friendly. For a wake-up call, one of the proprietors' neighbors tapped on the window over my head. I woke up with his friendly, inquisitive grin right in my face. Breakfast was served in the kitchen, where the table was laid out with all manner of fresh bread, jams, cheese and meat. The owner also cooked me a few eggs, made to order. I paid around $20 per night for my room, and was very pleased with the whole experience. I will try to get more specific information on private apartments in Budapest, but the lodging booking center across the street from the Marriott can set you up with this kind of room.

Salzburg Photos

I took a day trip to Salzburg with a friend last October. I lived in Austria for 4 years without visiting this gem. I can't believe I waited so long! Salzburg is a beautiful city, packed with things to see and photograph. The landscape, the architecture - it's all straight out of a story book.

As you can see, the skies were overcast. I'll visit Salzburg again this Summer and take some pictures with blue sky backgrounds. Foreground: Salzach River, Middleground: Altstadt (old city), Background: the fortress (watching over the city). More Salzburg Altstadt photos .

This is the impressive Salzburg Hohe Festung (high fortress). It sits atop Mönchsberg (Monk's Mountain), overlooking the city. The views from the fortress are amazing - beautiful, lush fields bounded by majestic mountains from some points, and bird's eye views of the city from others. More Salzburg Hohe Festung photos.

Forever Hungry Exhibition Opening (Bratislava, Slovakia)

I attended an exhibition opening (Forever Hungry) in Bratislava on Thursday.

Twins II - Andrea Bartošová. One of the artworks on display at the exhibition.

Musical entertainment was provided by a Slovakian band called ETHNA.

Bratislava Hlavná Stanica (Slovakia)

I went to Bratislava Thursday afternoon for an exhibition opening. I took this picture in the Hlavná Stanica (main train station) a few minutes before catching the train back to Vienna.

I am experimenting with different post sizes and styles (read - shorter and more frequent). I'll get more Bratislava pictures, as well as some pictures of Vienna with snow, online this weekend. Also, I'm going to make some of my hi-res images available. Click on the above picture to see its hi-res version (~3.1MB / 3072x2048 pixels).

Perchtenlauf (Mallnitz, Kärnten) Photos

Happy New Year / Prosit Neujahr!

I've got a backlog of photos, but I want to jump ahead and get this batch online immediately.

Last week I travelled by train to Mallnitz, Carinthia (Kärnten), in the mountains south of Salzburg with my mom, 3 siblings and brother's girlfriend (Bina). We met Christian and Connie, an awesome Australian/Austrian pair of friends of ours, there. At least 30cm (1 foot) of snow had fallen in Mallnitz that day, and it continued to fall through the night. Some of our crew stayed in an old, working farmhouse; the rest of us in Connie's parents' new vacation apartment (thanks Christian, Connie and Herr und Frau B!).

These pictures are of the Perchtenlauf, a cool festival thrown in Mallnitz the night we were there. The characters are called Perchten, and the festival originates in pre-Christian German / Norse mythology. The Perchten seem to spring from a legend about Freya, the goddess queen and wife of Odin / Wotan. The Perchten were ghosts who came out around New Year's Eve. Their job was to protect order in society. They could see into souls and would punish children who were disobedient or disorderly.

The masks are usually made from hand-carved wood and animal horns. The costumes are made from animal skins and fur. The Perchten carry whips, which they use to punish bad people they find along the run. I got a couple of whips. They didn't hurt, but they weren't light, either.

Perchten groups from different regions of Austria participated in this Perchtenlauf. There were several distinct styles of Perchten on display. Also, the Germans do a Perchtenlauf, but it looks a bit different than this one.

I've found some good links and info on the Perchten, much of it in German. I'll try to caption these and get some good links online quickly.

Sorry, No Photos Here

I do have an abundance of new, interesting pictures to put online, but my mom and two younger sisters are visiting Vienna for the holidays, and I'm running on very little sleep.

We've been walking all over Vienna - Naschmarkt, Mariahilferstrasse, Kärntnerstrasse, the Graben, Rotenturmstrasse, Griechengasse, Grinzing, Hietzing, and even up at Kahlenberg. We've visited the Christmas markets at the Rathaus, Spittelberg and Schloß Schönbrunn. We also walked some of the gardens at Schönbrunn and toured the inside of the palace -- and that's just in Vienna!

Yesterday we took a train to Mallnitz in Kärnten / Carinthia. "We" includes my mom, my younger brother (Craig), his girlfriend (Sabrina), my two younger sisters (L. and S.) and I. Mallnitz is a tiny, picturesque Alpine village in the Hohe Tauern (High Towers) National Park. Grossglockner, Austria's tallest mountain at 3,797 meters (12,457 feet) is part of the Hohe Tauern range, and is not far from Mallnitz.

Mallnitz threw an exciting festival last night. The setting was perfect - more than a foot of pristine snow fell on the town and surrounding areas yesterday -- excellent timing. The festival was held in the town square - a stream running through it, typical, centuries-old alpine architecture surrounding it. The festival centered around the Perchten, demons with roots in pre Christian Norse/Germanic mythology. Perchten seem to originate from a legend about Freya, wife of Odin/Wotan, chief of the Nordic gods.

But it's 6:25 (AM) and I need some sleep (another big day tomorrow), so I can't do the whole post tonight. The pictures of the festival, and of our time in Salzburg, are great, and the info I'm finding on the Perchten (most in German) is pretty interesting stuff.

I will get the pictures online ASAP.