This may have just been one of the most interesting days of my life. My friend and I were off to an early start, checking out of the hostel before any of our roommates were awake and headed across the street to the train station (oh how nice it is to be centrally located!) after a quick coffee and donut stop nearby and patiently waited for our train that would take us to Prague to arrive. People started to crowd around the stop in clusters so we figured we were in the right place, but 10 minutes... and 5 minutes before the train was supposed to come... nothing showed up. A police officer asked to see our tickets and we pointed and asked "Here, to Prague?" and he sent us across the way to the next platform over where a train was waiting to leave. Confused and thinking we were lost in trasnlation we looked around and it seemed everyone was being rerouted to that train. I kept hearing slight mentions of Prague and figured the policeman knew what he was talking about, so we sat anxiously waiting for some English explanation, but the only announcements were in German. But what else were we supposed to do? So we sat tight and the train started to move out of the station and we were out in the industrial outskirts of Munich again, whizzing past green lawns and orange rooftops with dark wooden accents lining ever windowsill. However, instead of a direct train to Prauge this train said "Landshut" as its final destination. We started to panic again, but nothing you can do when you're on a moving train... So we both fell asleep until an attendant came to check our tickets and told us that we had to go further up in the train because this section was going to detach at the next stop.

We frantically grabbed our bags and ran to one of the first cars on the train to make sure we were not going to be left behind, and ended up on another two-hour leg to Passan. Somewhere along the way I heard the mumble of the words "strike" and "ALX" (the train company that was supposed to be a direct trip) mixed in with some German babbling and we realized we would have to endure a major change of plans. Little did we know how unfortunate this strike would be to our carefully planned trip. At the Passan station we followed the crowd and transferred to another tiny little train of only two cars that was destined for Bayerich Einstein. Don't ask me to locate that on a map, but I'm pretty sure it's one of the last stops in Germany. We found a sizable group of Korean travelers who kept asking people for Prague so we followed suit with them and eventually settled into our seats for a few more hours of German forest and farmland. When the little train screeched to a stop we exited to a flurry of snowflakes in our faces. When I wiped away the moisture from my eyelashes I noticed a small wooden hut-like station with one lobby and a bathroom. There was literally nothing else around it except for snow-covered trees and four sets of train tracks in front. Where the heck are we now..... We had no idea. So we asked the man at the counter (who spoke absolutely no English) walked outside and pointed us to a train when we showed him our tickets (he looked just as puzzled to see the multiple ticket-check stamps from the different trains we were on as we were) and we curled up in the small little Harry Potter-esque train cabin complete with red leather upholstery and everything with a dusting of powdered snow outside the window in hopes that we'd finally arrive in Prague.

The rest of the trip was more snow and more forests, though we started passing by more hut-like buildings which I guess signified that we were finally out of Germany and in the Czech Republic (that and someone came by to check our passports). We were starting to get antsy and wondered when we'd be in Prague, and had a little mix-up when we arrived at Plzen h.na. train station because it was similar to Praha h.na. (very different towns, we now know). Some Czech guys who seemed to have just come from the slopes tumbled into our little train cabin and we pointed to the ticket and the station to ask if we were at the right place and they nodded enthusiastically, but turns out that meant we were on the right train but not yet at the right stop. We figured this out as we got off here and realized there was no subway, so ran back up to the platform where thankfully the train had not yet left and stood in the hallway until one of the cabins opened up and we could sit until our final destination of Praha h.na.

Once we finally made it to the Prague central station we were so happy we could cry! We were starved beyond belief because our last meal had been before 8 am and it was already nearing 5 pm, but we decided to push through and get to the hostel. A metro ride, a quick tram trip, and a walk up a hill later we arrived at our hostel and collapsed on the beds. Our two friends who were to meet us in Prague messaged us saying they'd be there in a few hours and we should get dinner but we were about to pass out with hunger so decided to wander down the street (casually running into the tower marking the Charles Bridge) to get a quick sandwich. Oh it was one of the most glorious things in the world after our expected 5.5 hour trip to Prague turned into more like 10 hours of stressful train-hopping in the middle of the German wilderness.

Once our friends arrived and we swapped our travel horror stories we headed down the adorable street the hostel was on and ended up at U Kocoura. We all ordered a round of much-deserved Czech beer and sat amongst the locals eating potato dumplings and pork. It was a very happy dinner to say the least. What made it even better was the group sitting right behind us, a few older men and women with some middle-aged couples who all started to sing what seemed to be Czech folk songs. The old man in the center was teaching the younger man which tone to sing and and his voice boomed in alto as the woman joined him in an almost operatic soprano and they harmonized across the table. It was so great to be in this jolly atmosphere and feel like we were experiencing the real Czech culture (we were the only non-Czechs... and only ones under the age of 35 there)! Apparently it's a regular thing because we passed by this restaurant on some other nights and always heard singing inside, which made us all warm and happy inside. Also the potato dumplings were probably one of the best dishes I've ever eaten, not to mention it was so comforting after the terrible day we had spent on the train. I liked Prague immediately after this night, and it was a good night's sleep after we arrived back in our hostel with droopy eyes and stomachs filled to the brim!