I had a whirlwind week and had the opportunity to visit Prague, Czechoslovakia and London, England last week. Two nations, 4 days.

Prague is a fascinating city, I wish I had more time (actually, any time would have been good) to walk about and experience the city. My impressions of this very old city:

1.       As we drove from the airport, I was wondering what it would be like as the entire area near the airport is filled with cold war buildings. Very Russian looking – lots of concrete, bland colours (with a smattering of brighter colors). Dreary looking. Then you drive past Prague Castle, and everything changes. You drive around a bend and the below you are buildings that are 800, 900 years old in bold colours with beautiful architecture. Spectacular. North America does not have this type of history.

2.       Graffiti is very prevalent, everywhere. Some of the graffiti is art; other graffiti is just silly names. A shame.

3.       As we drove, we stopped at a light and two men were bent over repairing the cobblestone on the walkway. Old craftsmanship still lives.

4.       It is expensive. 690 koruna for 1 hour of 256KB high speed in the hotel. Something like 1600 koruna for 24 hours of the high speed that we expect. It is approximately $6 CDN for every $100 koruna. In the hotel where we stayed, it was 330 euros per night.

5.       English was everywhere. The airports had signs that were in CZ and in English. I found that interesting, that they would cater to the English. All of the people interacted with spoke English.

Too bad I was in the hotel in meetings from 8AM to 8PM every day. The glory of business travel. I then popped over to London for 2 days for meetings. Boy, it was a long week.