We walked around his city and did some shopping and he told me about some of the "nuclear exercises" they did during his school recesses where they would practice putting these masks on and plastic suits. Looking back now it seems so crazy, but they were basically practicing in case of a nuclear war! We also walked past some underground bunkers that are in the middle of what is now a park. Eek. Thursday we all left to go to a really nice cottage about an hour or so from Prostejov. I'm not exactly sure where it was, since I just got in the car, fell asleep, and then when I woke up, were were there!
But the cottage was really nice, it was basically a huge fancy log cabin near a big ski resort area, which in the summer has a lot of mountain bikers and hikers. The cottage is owned by one Marek's (Ondrej's brother) friends. We got there, settled in, and then went on about an hour or so hike through the woods and some valleys to a restaurant for lunch. 
The hike was pretty calm for me, Ondrej got attacked a few times by his brother, niece and nephew. I stayed out of it, except to take pictures. 
One thing that seemed really strange is that people bring their dogs everywhere around here.
And it seemed normal for there to be dogs in the restaurants, either sitting in their owners laps or just on the floor next to them. We walked in and the dog from the cottage we were staying at was there already just wandering around the restaurant. After lunch we hiked back to the cottage and just relaxed for the rest of the day. Ondrej set a few traps that evening for mice, but the only thing we found in the morning was a beetle munching on the grains... :( 
This morning we drove back to Prostejov, stopping a few places along the way. We found some mice in one of the shops, but unfortunately they're not the kind he needs! 
So tomorrow morning we'll be leaving on the official mouse hunt! We'll be heading south through Austria and into Italy. We'll probably spend the night tomorrow in Austria somewhere and then continue into Italy on sunday sometime. We plan to do some hiking in the Dolomites and then, who knows!
6 comments:
Hi Michelle, this is Jill's boyfriend Marty. I studied in Prague for a semester and I echo your sentiments about the dogs. One time we were leaving a bar and as I opened the door to the street, this furry dog that came up to my waist walked on in and proceeded through to the bar. I took a look outside and there was owner to be seen, just a dog waiting for someone to open the door for him so he could whet his whistle.
Seems like a little slice of Heaven! I'm glad they made it through the Nuclear days!
Hey, if you guys are just walking around the Dolomites I did a search on Geocaching.com and there are eleven caches (at least) that are in Italy and have the word; "Dolomite" in them. There's one at the summit but I figured that'd be too hard for Michelle! It does have a Travel bug though! If your interested in placing a cache I'll help you set it up from this end! (you probably didn't bring your Garmin GPSr did you :(
Good luck with the Mousies!
yo! when you get a chance will you please tell us about the mouse study? i seem to have deleted the email where you explained it to me and your public (becky for one) has inquired.
i'm looking forward to seeing some pix of the permanent detainees.
xxoox
Aww man, it won't show the photos on my end! It just has a box with a little red "x" in it. Guess I'll keep trying... So you could have brought Tayda and Lenny after all!
Hi Michelle,
You missed the dump truck a couple of times today ;-)
But don't feel too bad about missing them. You are catching mice and that is much more fun. And at the same time enjoying the scenery and hospitality of Europe.
I'll keep you up to date about dump truck activities and have a blast!
Cheers,
Peter
along w/all your other talents...that fork balancing trick you're doing is AMAZING!
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