Some aspects of village life in Stará Oleška

Bus 436 for Decín hl.n. © Ricky Yates

I promised back in May that, having moved from Prague to Stará Oleška, I would now write and reflect on my new life in North Bohemia. So here is a post about some of the practical aspects of village life, often in stark contrast to my experience during the previous eight and a half years of living in Prague.

Public transport

Stará Oleška lies on the 436 bus route which provides a service from the village, into the centre of Decín, terminating at the main railway station – Decín hl.n. In the opposite direction, it is possible to travel further into the hills to Jetrichovice and occasionally slightly further, . . . → Read More: Some aspects of village life in Stará Oleška

My Liebster Blogger Award – part one

A month ago yesterday, this blog was nominated for another award – A Liebster Blogger Award. This is an award given by fellow bloggers, to show appreciation for other blogs that they enjoy reading and think deserve to be highlighted and receive some praise.

My blog was nominated by Emily aka Writergem, whose own blog Czechesotans, is also about living as an expat in Prague; in her case, from the viewpoint of being an American teaching in an international school here for the past year. In her nomination of my blog she says, ‘Consider yourself educated after reading this one’. I did say in reply that I clearly needed fresh polish for my halo after receiving such praise 🙂

As part of the nomination process, the nominator sets a . . . → Read More: My Liebster Blogger Award – part one

Wedding at Bouzov Castle

Bouzov Castle © Ricky Yates

On Monday 29th July, I conducted my first wedding of 2013, when Daniel, the British bridegroom, married Iva, his Czech bride, at Bouzov Castle. The castle lies in the rolling wooded hills of Moravia, about thirty minutes drive north-west of Olomouc.

As long-standing readers of my blog may know, this was not the first time I have conducted a wedding at Bouzov Castle. For I conducted my first-ever wedding in the Czech Republic at this same venue just over four years ago, also between a British bridegroom, Lea, and his Czech bride, Petra. You can read all about it and see the photos, here.

It was finding this post about Lea and Petra’s wedding on my blog, that prompted Daniel to contact me earlier this year, asking if I would be willing and available to conduct their wedding. As with . . . → Read More: Wedding at Bouzov Castle

The joys of Czech public transport

Diesel car ‘Verunka’ © Ricky Yates

The Czech Republic has one the most dense rail networks in the whole of Europe. One of the very few benefits of over forty years of communist rule is that nearly all of it is still in existence and in use. Unlike in the UK, where over a third of the rail network was made redundant in the 1960s by Dr. Beeching, no one in the Czech Republic ever saw any part of their rail network as being ‘uneconomic’ and therefore needing to be closed down.

On Friday 28th June during our recent holiday in the Orlické hory, we walked around fourteen kilometres from our hotel in Rícky v Orlických horách, all along a waymarked footpath which follows the valley of the Rícka and Zdobnice rivers. At the end of our walk, we arrived in . . . → Read More: The joys of Czech public transport

A snowy weekend in Prague

Kostel sv Kliment / St. Clement’s Church in the snow © Ricky Yates

Last weekend, we had the heaviest snowfall here in Prague, since early January 2010. It started snowing late on Friday 22nd February and rarely stopped until just before Sybille and I left the Chaplaincy Flat to go to Church on Sunday morning. To give you a visual impression, here is a picture showing what Kostel sv Kliment / St. Clement’s Church looked like last Sunday, covered and surrounded by freshly fallen snow.

But in contrast to the UK, where everything seems to grind to a halt as soon as any snow falls, here in the Czech Republic, that just does not happen. So it was that Tram 8 arrived on time at 10.07 at the Podbaba tram stop, and whisked us off on our sixteen minute journey to Dlouhá trída, . . . → Read More: A snowy weekend in Prague