For those of you with experience in Prague/Czech Republic-
How practical is it to rent a car?
There are a couple of places outside Prague I would like to visit on the weekend (in particular the JAWA Motorcycle Museum of Konopiště, about 20 miles outside Prague), and I am considering renting a car.
Thanks
Janet
"David Harrington" <ietfdbh@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote on 03/07/2007 12:30:20 PM:
> Hi,
>
> I travelled to Prague after the Vienna IETF in 2003.
> It's a city; you need to take city precautions.
>
> There are signs of poverty, mostly outside the city center. I was
> surprised when I arrived (by train) by people aggressively trying to
> rent me a room in their house, and by taxi drivers who grab your bag
> and try to lead you to their taxi. Things might have changed by now,
> or not.
>
> I accepted a room in a private home from a person at the airport, 45
> minutes by train outside of Prague, where people are striving to make
> enough to join the middle class. My landlord was a doctor, who found
> it more profitable to rent rooms in his house than practice medicine.
> Most IETFers will be better off financially, and will show it, so we
> become obvious targets.
>
> In three weeks of travelling through the Czech Republic and Slovakia,
> with no reservations and usually renting a room (a zimmer) in private
> houses, I met many wonderful people and never had a problem. I
> travelled alone at night usually. I was probably lucky, since I did
> not take many precautions that are simply common sense.
>
> Prague is a wonderful tourist spot with good food, good bier, quality
> shopping, lots of culture, and many interesting things to see. I rate
> it as one of my favorite cities in Europe.
>
> So I agree that Prague is very survivable.
>
> David Harrington
> dharrington@xxxxxxxxxx
> dbharrington@xxxxxxxxxxx
> ietfdbh@xxxxxxxxxxx
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Dave Crocker [mailto:dhc2@xxxxxxxxxxxx]
> > Sent: Wednesday, March 07, 2007 12:03 PM
> > To: IETF Discussion
> > Subject: Re: Prague
> >
> >
> >
> > Edward Lewis wrote:
> > > I will attest to Prague being survivable. I have been there once
> > > already and suffered no ill effects and was not robbed.
> > I.e., don't panic.
> > ...
> > > At 14:52 -0500 3/6/07...:
> > > ...
> > >> Under the entry for taxis from the airport they say "Warning:
> > >> Prague's taxi drivers ...
> >
> >
> > When the IETF started having the meetings outside the U.S.,
> > there seemed to be
> > two basic reasons. One was to adjust the burden of attendee
> > travel, with a
> > slight shift towards more fairness for attendees from outside
> > the U.S. The
> > other was to have our presence in the locale serve to
> > encourage improvements
> > to the local infrastructure.
> >
> > The former is obviously still valid. By and large, the
> > latter hasn't been for
> > a number of years. So it really is not reasonable for us to
> > go to places that
> > have poor Internet services, except that I'm one of those
> > folk who think that
> > having to go through a meeting venue learning curve for
> > installing and
> > debugging the net makes our meeting more fragile than it
> > should be. But even
> > that issue has gotten far less risky around the world, even
> > for first-time
> > IETF presence.
> >
> > But it occurs to me that there is an additional benefit that
> > has been lurking,
> > and I think it just surfaced: We kind folk from the U.S.
> > tend to have very
> > little understanding of what is "normal" elsewhere in the
> > world. Even those
> > of us with real travel experience often are so sheltered in
> > those trips, or
> > narrow in our venues, we have no serious basis for
> > appreciating what to worry
> > about, and what to merely be cautious about.
> >
> > A month before the Paris IETF, I was in Paris, at the same
> > convention center,
> > and had my wallet stolen as I was leaving the Metro. First
> > such experience.
> > Very traumatizing. But I'm hard-pressed to view Paris as
> > more dangerous than
> > any large U.S. city. And Amsterdam has public signs warning
> > of pick-pockets.
> > Should we avoid it, too? My Paris trauma came at the end
> > of a fabulous day,
> > and although during IETF week, I had a bit of a tremor when I
> > had to use the
> > same metro station, it was, still, the same, wonderful Paris
> > of the travel books.
> >
> > Frankly, I have the same worries about Prague as John. I have
> > read the same
> > sorts of cautions that he has and must admit that seeing such
> > cautions show up
> > in a Frommer's is pretty unusual.
> >
> > So, I fully intend to be on guard. (And I am staying at a
> > place that will
> > require serious use of the transit system.)
> >
> > But, then, that's the lesson: Some places are seriously
> > dangerous. We should
> > stay away from them. Some merely warrant caution. And most
> > places that
> > American's worry about are no worse than most cities in the
> > U.S. Just different.
> >
> > Yes, it can be a challenge to find credible ways to
> > distinguish between the
> > two, but it's clear that the otherwise review of published
> > reports is not
> > sufficient.
> >
> > d/
> > --
> >
> > Dave Crocker
> > Brandenburg InternetWorking
> > bbiw.net
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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> > https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
> >
>
>
>
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