Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic

This past weekend was pretty low key once again. Friday night we had a girls night out (seeing Ramona and Beezus) and a guys night out (Dad and Haaken went bowling). Both parties were very happy with their choices. Haaken was beating Dad through the 7th frame when I finally figured out what I was doing wrong and then the second game we took turns bowling with the goal of getting the dinosaur graphics on the scorecard to show up. The girls had a great time also and highly recommend Ramona and Beezus which is very much geared toward mothers and daughters. Saturday we had planned on going to Amberg which is about 30 minutes away, but ended up doing pretty much nothing all day. That evening we skyped with Luke, Courtney, Lauren and Lil and then went to the PX to get school supplies. Hard to believe school starts up again in 3 weeks.

Sunday we managed to get up and out of the house. We visited a spa town in the Czech Republic called Karlovy Vary (which apparently translates to Carlsbad). The town has a beautiful main street that straddles the Tepla River. The town is famous for it's thermal springs which produce water that supposedly has healing powers. Along the main street, there are 13 springs that can be sampled by visitors. The map we got at an information booth informed us that each year 50,000 patients are sent to Karlovy Vary by their doctors to drink the magical water. It's said to be able to cure many ailments including: Digestive tract disorders, Metabolic disorders, Diabetes, Gout, Obesity, Gingivitis, Locomotor system disorders, Diseases of the liver, pancreas, gall bladder, and biliary ducts, Oncological convalescents, and Neurological diseases. Pretty incredible, eh? Near each spring is a little souvenir kiosk where you can purchase ugly and surely overpriced porcelain mugs with built in straws. The town was busy and they were making a killing on these mugs, and of course we ended up buying them for the kids. Carissa was warned that the water is an acquired taste and whoever told her that was correct. The water was very salty and maybe a little bitter. As we walked along, we sampled them all, which vary in temperature. At one of the hotter springs, Carissa provided the kids with a tea bag from her purse which improved the taste quite a bit.

Karlovy Vary

Preparing to be healed

Hallelujah!

After a while we sat down and had lunch at a little cafe beside the river and then continued down the main street. At the end of the street is the largest and hottest spring, which is enclosed in a very modern and therefore very out of place steel and glass building. This spring shoots steaming water 20 - 30 feet in the air while the tourists gather around and watch, most of them (including us) munching on wafer cookies that are made using the spring water. The wafers were cheap and actually quite good.

Lunch

We then made our way to a nearby church, snapped a few pictures and headed back for the car. There is more to see there but we figured we'll be back at some point and we wanted to get home before it got too late. This week the kids have a couple field trips through the base and then on Saturday we head to Salzburg, Austria. I suppose we'll have to rent the Sound of Music before we leave.