The year 2007

Okay, lets say that I gave up on writing about my USA round-trip... Maybe - but really maybe I will write something later, but for now, lets leave it like it is.

There are 5 days to the end of the year 2007 and I couldnt help but remember, what all happened during this year. I wont lie if I say, that it year brought most changes into my life ever...good or bad ones - hard to say yet.

The beginning of the year was rather difficult. I was ending my Bachelor studies and all I remember the whole January was studying studying, being really stressed out and studying again. I did 3 bachelor exams during this month - Obchodni podnikani (business studies), statistics and the state exam - international trade. Uff... I am getting a headache just thinking about it.. :)
I had a looot of luck - I am that honest :-) - and managed to finish everything and in February I became the Bachelor of Science :-)

Not much was happening from February till April - just that I started to think more about my future, what I want to do, and I was being a bit disappointed with where I was going to. I started to be more active - I took dance, swimming lessons - and decided to go to the US during the summer. Went to Amsterdam in February, was participating in International Week in Prague and went to Sweden at the end of April.

I think that going back to Sweden, I realised that I can really change my life if I dont like it the way it is and thats what I did.

Summer in the US was great. I met a lot of cool people, made a couple of good friends, learned useful things and traveled the US from East to the West. I was very pleasantly surprised by what US can offer to people. It was my first time being there after 10 years and it was just amazing. People were really nice - they give you so much positive energy; the beautiful nature and cities just take your breath...

After the US it was time to get back to the "real world" - for me it was back to school, moving to a new apartment in the city and finding a job...

It was hard getting back to school after such a great summer of just swimming, boating, travelling and basically having no worries.. I still have many exams in January, but I think I did so far ok.. Concerning school, I think I can always do better, but at least I have one success behind me and that is being the best team in presenting the strategy of repositioning of juice Jupi :-) We are now still waiting for the first "exciting" price and that is dinner with the marketing director of Kofola :-)) Just kidding... I think its a really cool price.. :-)

In August, I moved to an apartment with my friend Verca - which was a very positive step. I live now only 15 minutes from my uni, and its close to go anywhere... My room is still kind of empty, but I think that after I hang my pictures and get another carpet, it will look much better... The only negative thing about the apartment is the air.. Its really dusty here and since its in the centrum, the quality of the air is really bad...

And finally work. I was looking for some kind of a job for about 2 months. I was sending CVs to many places - although I knew that I wanted a "real job". No more short-term work, no more teaching English and no more folding files... This Friday, I found out that they chose me to ABN AMRO. I consider it as a success, because there were about 25 of us and they had only 2 places... I dont want to make any premature conclusions (I havent signed a contract yet), but a word and handshake is enough for me :-) The money should be good as well... I am not sure yet, but it should be ok :-)
For about 2 week, I have been working for Vodafone - which is a cool job as well. The work itself is quite boring - I am doing some reports - but I am working in a very nice environment and have cool men colleagues and got maaaany X-mas presents... (from Vodafone - really cool employer :-) )

So this was my year 2007. Moving 2 times, living in 4 different places for a period longer than 2 months, being single again after 3 years, becoming Bc, travelling a lot, having a "real job", my own budget and being really happy with myself... Very turbulent times, but I think the benefits are greater than the losses.

The funny thing is that you never know what happens next. Life itself brings you so many challenges and so many crossroads where you have to decide whats best for you.
The difficult thing is then to decide how you want to live - because you cannot choose two opposite things and you cannot rewind if you change your mind... Sometimes I wish I hadnt known my choices - things would be much easier :-) Staying with my former boyfriend, being satisfied with what I have and not wanting more. But I think that by wanting more and doing more for yourself, you position yourself at least a bit higher than you were before and thats always positive, even though not very easy...

So, to sum it up... Thank you whoever for such an amazing year!

More Yosemite photos

And here is the promised "posing bear"


Be careful, this really happens


Half dome on the top-left

Yosemite

I still havent given up on my blog... although updates dont happen very often, I am still trying and I am still writing :-)

So, San Francisco was the last, Yosemite was the second last - one of my favourites as well.

Its a national park about 3 hours drive from San Francisco, so you can imagine it gets very crowded during the weekend.. and thats exactly when we arrived.
Yosemite is a paradise for rock-climbers and women :-)) The rocks are perfect for rock-climbing, so people from all around the world come here to climb (women to look at the rock-climbers) ;)

As in every national park, you could spend weeks here, there is always something to do. We didnt have that much time, so took only a couple of trails. The longest we took was the "waterfall trail" - we saw two beautiful waterfalls while climbing pretty high. A reward after the first waterfall was a small lake with crystal clear cold water and a flat plateau where the water was just sliding down in a wide but shallow stream.

But when you come to Yosemite in the late summer, dont expect too many waterfalls. The biggest ones - Yosemite waterfalls were all dry. Luckily we didnt spend much hiking to the waterfalls, so the disappointment of looking at many rocks where you could see that something somewhere was a little darker (wet).

The biggest tour of Yosemite is the Half-dome tour. Its about 26km return hike, but you climb to the very top of Half-dome which is pretty amazing. The last few hundret of metres are made by ropes, where the terrain is so steep and smooth that there is no other way how to get there (see the picture) This time we didnt make it, but definitelly next time! ;)

Not to forget - Yosemite was the last park and the first bear we saw :-) It was eating some grass in the forrest near the highway not too much bothered by the photographing freaks surrounding it. It made a very nice pose of laying on the back and scratching its belly, though ;)

Flowers of SF

There are flowers everywhere and I just couldnt help but taking photos...here are my favourites :-)



Ok, the above is not a flower... :-)

San Francisco photos

Golden Gate bridge


one of the steep streets


Lombard street


biking the bridge


Pier 39 - sea lions

San Francisco

I decided to describe the journey backwards.. why? Firstly - I hope I will remember the most recent things more than the ones that happened earlier. Secondly - San Francisco was my most favourite part of the journey.. Hopefully it wont be too confusing :-)

So....San Francisco...what to say..

After 3 and something weeks of traveling with 3 other Czech people, we separated our ways in SF. They drove back to New York to return our rental car (it is way cheaper if you rent and return at the same place) and I stayed in SF for almost 4 days..

The first highlight of my stay was a fact, that I absolutelly accidentally, not-intentionally met a friend I met about 3 months ago at a lifeguarding training... I was buying some bread at a local supermarket (somewhere in the streets - not even in the centre) and who do I see there...? I had even no idea that she was in San Francisco. After that we found out we were staying in the same hostel... was it just a coincidence?? I believe it was destiny!!
After that we spent days sightseeing and nights partying :-) :-)

San Francisco highlights

Cable-cars
The most famous public transportation of SF - cable cars - very convenient because of the hilly terrain. They look like from all the movies :-) Operated by one man who moves a strange stick. The other man is a ticket-man. I took a ride once (they cost USD5 for 1 ride...) and it was definitelly worth it. Even though I didnt want to at first it was just an unique experience. You have to hold yourself all the time, because the ride is not smooth at all and you are either going up the hill or down the hill.. Straight ways are not that common.

China town
My favourite part of the city was china town. You will definitelly know you entered it, because it seems like you entered a different world. Streets are FULL of chinese people, you dont hear any English, just Chinese. Signs on houses are written in chinese characters, only sometimes in English. There are very distinctive smells all over the streets, markets with fresh fruit/vegetables/meat (many exotic ones), chinese restaurants, shop with chinese groceries... My favourite part of the day was walking around, buying my favourite fruits that I havent eaten for a couple of years and eating a real chinese food that tastes like real chinese food (not the "Czech-chinese cuisine"...) and hearing Chinese and sometimes even speaking it.

The only thing that seemed worried me, was the fact, that some of the people that lived there dont really live in San Francisco. They speak very bad English (I wonder if some of them maybe dont speak English at all) and it just seems weird that after such a long time, their culture hadnt changed/adapted to the American at all..

All in all - San Francisco is a very beautiful city. Its very clean, streets are wide. Everytime you climb a hill you have a beautiful view. Houses are often painted white/or light colours and it gives the city a specific "light" athmosphere. Even though its quite a big city, there is a lot of green everywhere. Parks, flowers, trees all over, light wind from the ocean, beaufiul beaches (even though its not very good for swimming - I was even told you are not allowed to swim there because of the sharks and dangerous currents)
Its not very good for biking though. There are many bike-rentals all over the city that suggest that you bike through the Golden Gate Bridge, or just bike around. We did that (mistake!!)- I thought it will be a nice, easy bike around..but it was really exhausting.. Just imagine - up the hill, down the hill, up the hill... Ok, to be fair, biking through the bridge was nice, but the rest of the day was just full of pain.. :(

Yes, I am still alive

For those of you who thought that I vanished from the world I have good news (hopefully).. I am still here.

For the past 3 and half weeks I have been traveling with 3 cool people around the US. I am in San Francisco now, the most west I will get on this journey. I will spend 4 days here and then I am headed to New York and after a day there I am going home.

I think I will try to write a couple of notes for every place we have been to.. so just to make a short list, we started in Bradford, New Hampshire on the 19th of August. Went mainly to National parks (for example: Rocky mountains, Arches, Grand Canyon, Death Valley, Sequoia, Yosemite, etc... ) did a lot of hiking, camping and especially driving. We drove all the way to the west coast, so that was about 6000 miles on our counter. Today my friends dropped me off in SF and I am on my own and on the internet after a veeery long time. And tonight will be the first time sleeping in a proper bed after a loong time (about 3 months with only 1 exception)

4 weeks of travels, many great experiences. Stay tuned for the Cross-American journey :)

Camp pictures

Last day at camp, tomorrow we are leaving for Niagara Falls.


Waterfront


Two lifeguards - me and Ariel :)


Shopping gang...


Teddy

The next plans

Last day of camp today, the campers are leaving tomorrow and after that there are three days for all the staff to clean and close the camp. I am quite happy that the camp is over but I know that I will miss it here.

Yesterday was a very nice day because I got to ride a horse after a quite long time and got to trot and post almost the right way for the first time. My horse was Teddy and for me the best one so far. It was definitely the nicest ride ever. After that we had a twilight boating which was very fun as well.

I dont know most of my traveling plans yet, but I bought a return flight from San Francisco to New York, where I will spend 2 days and then go back home. I should come to Prague on the 19th of September in the evening. But I still have 4 weeks of traveling ahead of me and am really excited about that.

Another weekend...

water aerobics

This week went by fast. We got about 130 campers, that is the most we got so far. Therefore it was very busy. We had swimming lessons basically non-stop and on two days, we were guarding even after dinner. I would say that it was the worse week so far, maybe because it was so busy, maybe because I have been here for 5 weeks already and some things are getting annoying, maybe both.. :)

my home for 3 weeks

A great changed happened. I am no longer living in a tent. I was moved to a beautiful cabin for the following week and I am just sooo happy about it. 3 weeks in a tent were enough and I can just hope that after this week, I will stay in this nice cabin and not move anywhere :)

Yesterday we went shopping (for a change ;0) ) and today I decided to stay in camp. I organised all my laundry, watched a movie, cooked lunch, went swimming and now we will probably watch a movie again.


squirrel

Time is running really fast and I will be out of camp in 3 weeks. Excited on one side, sad on the other, but will try to enjoy and get best out of the remaining period.

One day adventure in Boston

Our one day in Boston was great. We managed to see so much we couldnt even believe it... :)

First we went to the top of Predential tower - which is the tallest building in Boston - and had a spectacular view of the center. We went up to the 52nd floor and could see Boston from all four sides of the building. Although there are some skyscrapers in the middle of the city, most of the buildings were rather small. And there are plenty of green areas in the city as well.

Right after that we did a lot of walking. We went to some shopping streets, saw the famous "Cheers" bar where series Cheers were shot, saw the bay where Bostons Tea Party took place and rested in one of the parks. Ofcourse we did a lot of shopping as I finally bought a pair of really nice high-heel shoes :) (was looking for a pair for a couple of years...)

The highlight of the day was the whale-watching. Apparently, whales are now moving from the Carribian see back to the Greenland area and they go through Boston. We took a boat and were riding for about an hour until we saw the first whales. We were lucky to see many of them, and one was just next to our boat so we got a good look at it. We saw two species which names I unfortunatelly forgot - but what I didnt forget is that one of them has partly white tale.. On the way back we saw the most beautiful sunset ever. The sky was just orange and moon was over the skyline of Boston..

Now I am back in the camp, back in reality for the next 4 weeks as I realised and its a big shock.. From a big beautiful city to a place where nobody lives.. See you soon Boston :)

Boston - pictures

On a whale-watching boat. View of Boston


Us :) Me, Magda and Monique


Skyscrapers


Whale


Bostons skyline as we were going back from the whale watching

Boston/ What a strange country

This weekend I am in Boston. We arrived today with a bus full of children from last week session and on Sunday we are going back to Wabasso with new campers for next session. Meanwhile we are staying at a sister camp - Cedar Hill that is very close to Boston.

I feel really tired. I hope that I can rest for some time in Boston - rest from children, squirrels, sleeping in a tent, outside showers, lake...well... I really need to have some time off the camp :)

Boston looks like a very friendly city. Streets are small, nice and cosy, with 19th century houses that look like houses in Holland - tall and narrow with steps at the front. In the center of the city there are skyscrapers, but as I said, sort of friendly looking and you can see green everywhere. There is a big park in the middle. The city itself doesnt look so busy as New York. In should have only about 500.000 inhabitants, but with the suburbs should be around 3 mil.

Tomorrow we will spend the whole day walking around, taking a duck-tour, and shopping ofcourse :))

But I have to say I am a little surprised - or I dont know how else to put it - with the American people. Every person we had met so far is crazy in some way... but crazy meaning that you really notice that the person is strange and you are quite scared... another story with a taxi driver who stopped in the middle of the road because his phone was ringing even though there were cars driving behind him... Americans are strange...

Time management

Its unbelievable how fast time flies here and how almost every minute of your day is planned... I try to use every spare time I have...

My typical day
Today I got up at 6:30 to go swimming till 7, breakfast at 8, 9:15 first swimming with kids till 11:15 and then we have time until 12:15 for lunch...
We usually use this time to do some more swimming or boating (as I did today). 1:30 is already next swimming with kids until 4:30 and then till 5 :30 boating.
At 6 is dinner already and at 7 (which is now :)) I am ready to use my two spare hours of the day to go horseback riding :) There I am until 9 and I have to be back at my unit - usually talking to "my girls" - that is my unit.
Well, and then just try to get my couple of hours of sleep in a tent and the same thing next day.. :)

Random photos

New York


Me with a lifeguarding tube


Waterfront where we stay most of the day


Boating lake


First time riding - Me and Flying Dutchman :))

My birthday/ the first week at camp

Today is a special day. First - its my birthday, second - its been a week since I came to the camp. I wont comment much on the first one, because I still have problems with actually saying the number of years I just turned... not that I would feel old or regret anything I had done in the past xx years, but the number itself just doesnt sound good.

How is the camp? Its really nice. We are - as I said before - in the middle of nowhere, in woods with two beautiful lakes. We sleep in wooden cabins, take a shower under the stars and are basically 24/7 outside which is great! There are squirrels and chipmonks running everywhere...its amazing.. We can even see loads of fish in the lakes... well...mosquitos as well unfortunatelly.. :( The campers havent come yet, so its been a lot of fun + learning in the past week. We did a lot of training about children behaviour, how to handle them, etc. which was very usefull - well I am really excited about Sunday when they come if I will recall all that we practiced and actually apply it on the campers. We also did a lot of games with other staff + other trainings like canoe training!! :))

Tomorrow will be our first day off, so we will all make ourselves nice (lets say that the priority here is not that much about the looks) and go to Concord (capital of NH) for shopping... I hope to see more of the US now.

I will try to write more + publish photos as soon as possible - its a battle to be on the computer here... :0)

First days in the US

Here I am in the US!! I am somewhere near Boston waiting for dinner :) and later we are going to a camp for lifeguarding training.
I have just the best first impressions. As soon as I left Prague, I felt great - flying far far away to the unknown world, looking for new adventures. Even the trip in the plane was exciting. As we landed in New York I saw the skyscrapers townline and it was just beautiful.
New York is awesome... I didnt have much time to go out, but I was on the Broadway street, was ripped off by a taxi driver and was walking on the streets and looking high up on the skyscrapers. Its really a city that never sleeps.
Whats also funny is how all the people speak English ;) I know it sounds strange, but I am used to people using English only as a communication language. They normally have another native language... but here... they just speak English - so noone turns to his friend and says something you dont understand...
Well, thats about all that I can say right now. Ofcourse I slept for the past 2 days for only about 4 hours, my back hurts from carrying all my luggage around, but so far I am really happy that I did this.

Last minutes before leaving...

My packing has come to an end. I ended up with 2 bags and a small one. The first plan was to take just one...but somehow everything is important to take. They are not that heavy though... not more than 20 kg together. I am leaving to the airport in about 30 minutes... what can I say... just love the stress of late packing :-)
How do I feel? More scared than excited actually (did I pack everything? where the hell am I going?) - but hopefully will get over it soon.
I dont know about my internet connection at the camp yet, but I will try to write at least something :-)
OK, lets go... Flying from Prague to London, London to New York, spend one day there, New York - Boston (bus!!!), lifeguarding training and finally Wabasso Camp, NH!

Night full of culture

I just came back from a museum night, which is an event, where about 50 museums or similar objects are opened during the night, that is from 7 p.m. till 1 a.m., the entrance is free and there are many concerts and other events all around.

The night was beautiful. It was not too cold, not too hot - and we were walking around the center of Prague - and as I wrote before - it is still breathtaking, especially at night. We managed to see 4 museums and 1 concert. Museums were quite alright, one was an art museum - we saw some "sculptures" made of plastic bottles, next one was a painting exhibition, then a house built in cubist style and the last one was full of different objects (ritual weapons, jewellery,..) from all over the world (Tonga - for example...who knows where it is? ;-) )
The concert was also great - especially the atmoshpere. It was Gerschwin - some parts from Porgy and Bess at Valdstejnska zahrada. Too bad we didnt stay that long, because not all of our "museum crowd" (we were 4 girls) was much into classical music.. :-)

Well, not everything was great, especially the huge crowd of people cueing infront of almost every museum - which was the main reason why we didnt get to see all we wanted... But to sum it up, it was worth going :-)

2 days to go

Today is Saturday and I am leaving on Monday morning already. I havent started packing yet so I am very nervous as I always leave everything for the last moment... I did start shopping, but most of my attempts to buy something are unsuccesfull... I tried about 100 pairs of shoes on yesterday, but none seemed to be suitable for what I need... well...of course it may be because I dont really know what I need :-))
I just know I will be somewhere in the middle of the forest, with two bordering lakes (or one lake and one pond) - probably spending most of my time at the lake but what if it rains? Or what about after I finish at the lake? Anyway, these are my biggest worries at the moment.. Hopefully I will be more lucky with shopping today and in the evening I am looking forward to the Museum night in Prague :-)

Ready to go!

2 more weeks before flying to the US and I am already sooo excited! I searched through my parents library and found many maps, guide-books and photos - so now all I do is read, plan and realise that there are so many places I want to see and so little time.


I will be in the North-East, so I will be around cities like Boston, New York, Philadelphia, not too far from Niagara Falls. After that would be great to go and lay on a beach for a couple of days - who knows where :-) (Sweden last year was great - but water in the sea was way too cold) Well, we will see how it will end up.

Charming Prague

Last night after my dance class I didnt feel like going home so I took a walk around the center of Prague. Its been too long since my last time in the city and I almost forgot how beautiful and charming Prague is. Although I have lived here all my life...was even born here... it always gets me. I find everytime a different place I havent been to, or a place I have been to so many times, but see something new I havent noticed before.

It was just around 8 or 9 p.m. , the sky had this beautiful color of sunset, last rays of sun were touching the highest building, the air was warm... yeah...pretty romantic :-)

Before I went home I stopped at Narodni Trida to buy a pancake (the best pancakes in Prague). Definitelly a thing to try if you havent already.