Rollin', Rollin', Rollin' on the River

The Vltava River to be exact. On Thursday the 14th Amy and I travelled to České Budějovice for our final Rotary event of the year. We went canoeing on the Vltava River, which is the main river in the Czech Republic and runs through Prague. The weather had been awful all week so we were a little worried about the trip. On Thursday we just set up camp and then got to hang out with everyone and picked our canoeing partners; my friend April and I canoed together. On Friday morning we got up and packed up camp. Then we shoved everything into the canoes and were off. The weather had cleard up in the morning so it was nice and sunny and warm. We canoed from ten until two through the gorgeous countryside of the Czech Republic and at two we stopped for lunch. We all had Fried Cheese, a super Czech meal of just two squares of fried cheese and french fries. Around three we continued canoeing on through some rapids and it was a beautiful afternoon. At five we arrived at our camping spot and re-set up camp. Next was dinner; soup and noodles that we cooked over a gas fire thing. Then we just hung out with the other students and cooked our first s'mores in ten months over the communal fire. On Saturday morning we got up at nine and packed up the tents. Everyone was leaving at ten to go canoeing...except for Amy and I. We were leaving at ten to go back home because on Sunday we had to leave for Paris. Having said our goodbyes to the other exchangers with whom we had shared this amazing year we left for our final trip via public transportation together. Now, if you've read some of my other blogs you may know that we aren't exactly public transportation capable. We had finished canoed in Český Krumlov and at eleven we took a bus to Ceske Budejovice. From CB we took another bus to Prague, where we promptly got lost in the Prague subway system for two hours trying to get to the train station. After that little mishap we were a couple hours behind schedule, but we got a train to Brno and four and half hours later were back in Brno. My host family had been shopping in Brno that day and had waited for me to arrive before they left. Total time spent in transit: 11 hours. We had made the exact same trip on Monday in only 6 hours. And here I was thinking I had mastered public transportation.