We woke early, so we could get to the pool when it opened at 07:00 – I didn’t wear my Fitbit though, as I think that yesterday’s swim did for it 🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️ – that’s a job for Jezza today – hopefully he’ll be able to resurrect it, in which case, I shall call it Lazarus 😂😂. So instead, I counted my lengths – just like in the old days 😂😂 – the only difference was that I managed 50 lengths of a 12m pool, instead of 128 lengths of a 25m pool 🙄🙄. My excuse was that we had to be showered, packed and ready to leave at about 09:00 🤪.
Jezza enjoyed his swim, however, he’s not a prolific swimmer. To be able to play cricket at his school in the summer months, it was obligatory to have a 25m swimming certificate which he says he attained in doggy paddle 😂😂. Nonetheless, he still managed 20 lengths, which is 19 more than he usually swims 😂!!
We finished our swim and went back to our room to finish packing and get ready. I was a bit bemused to find Jezza’s swimming trunks (completely dry) on the pile of clothes to wear today and I realised that he had worn Primark’s finest boxer trunks for his swim – and it hadn’t even dawned on him 🤦🏻♀️🙄.
We checked out of the hotel and made our way to the bus stop in the pouring rain. Not only was it wet, but it was cold and windy too. Good job we weren’t going to be doing any sightseeing today. Our bus driver was the spitting image of Emma Hayes (ex Chelsea Women’s Manager, now USA coach)!! The bus stopped short of where Jezza was expecting, so we asked Emma where our FlixBus stop was. It was a 10 minute walk and luckily we found a budget supermarket (I can’t believe that we’ve been in Germany for a few days and seen neither an Aldi nor Lidl!!) where we got something to tide us over till dinner. I made the mistake of buying a packet of banana chips – very moreish on the 4 hour bus ride 🤦🏻♀️ 🐖 🐖.
After nearly a couple of hours on the road, the bus stopped for a 5 minute break just outside of Dresden – there were some rather snazzy looking toilets (pictured below). Unsurprisingly, I didn’t venture out of the bus, but there was a horrible smell of cigarettes when the passengers re-boarded the bus 😷😷.
Jezza dozed off on the bus, the odd snore 💤 waking him up, before nodding back off to sleep, and I did a bit of knitting and listened to the radio.
With about 45 minutes left on the journey, the bus seemed to go into limp mode – we were going up a hill, so I wasn’t too concerned. However, half an hour later, the bus still hadn’t picked up speed and it pulled into a service area. The driver didn’t say that there was a problem, so we just hoped for the best. We got on our way after about 10 minutes, without knowing why we stopped, but were thankful to be back on our way. 😅😅
We’d not long been in Czechia and I saw a Lidl 🤣🤣.
It was still raining when we got off the bus, but we only had a short walk to the train station. Fortunately, Jezza had done his homework and ascertained that travel was free for over 65s and 1/2 price for 60-64s. Prague was becoming quite appealing 😂😂. Jezza bought travel tickets to last our stay in Prague and it seems that I just have to keep ID on me if asked for proof of senior citizenship 🤪.
We got our train and fortunately, we were only a five minute walk from the Hotel DUO where we were staying. It was just gone 15:30 when we checked into our room. We had a kettle and fridge, so no problems for my tea and at last Jezza could chill the can of beer he’d been carrying around since Amsterdam 😂😂.
I unpacked and we went down for a sauna at about 17:00. The same thing happened – women in their costumes, but I really couldn’t be arsed today. We were both quite tired and left it.
Now that we had the luxury of a fridge, we were able to chill not only Jezza’s beer, but our bottle of rosé that we bought in Amsterdam (originating from our neck of the woods!) and we had a couple of glasses at wine o’clock before going to eat in the hotel restaurant. It was just as well that I’d had some rosé before dinner – Jezza ordered a beer and asked if Aperol Spritz was on the menu and it was, so we duly ordered one. Drinks came and I sipped mine, only to find it was flat, so I explained to the waitress that it wasn’t very nice. She took it away and brought me back a second one, saying they’d opened a new bottle of Prosecco for the drink. I don’t know how much Prosecco they put into the drink, but it was still flat. I explained that I make Aperol Spritzes regularly and have never managed to make a flat one, and this was the second that they had produced for me 🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️. I hoped for third time lucky, but it was in vain so I gave up, sent it back and had a glass of water. Seriously, how can it be so difficult? 🙄🙄
We decided on simple meals this evening as we’ve had more than a week of overeating. Jezza picked a chicken supreme with veg and mushroom sauce, and I had spinach and ricotta ravioli in tomato sauce. Both very acceptable. Jezza wanted something sweet, so he ordered a “special” dessert, described as rhubarb pie, citrus crumble, vanilla ice cream and strawberry- rhubarb sauce. We were expecting hot rhubarb crumble with ice cream but it was in fact very deconstructed and cold!! It did make us laugh, however, Jezza enjoyed it – that’s the main thing 🤪🤣.
We left the restaurant to chill in our room and watch the football. We’re starting to feel the strain of travelling around now – after all, we’re no spring chickens!! We’ll have to pace ourselves for the next few days methinks….
My Fitbit is still not working properly, so the steps count is from Jezza’s Fitbit. It’s 22:00 and we’ve said we’ll be in the pool for opening time – 07:00 – and tomorrow, Jezza will be swimming in his budgie smugglers 🤣😂.
Night night – see you tomorrow 😘
Total steps : 6,563
