Another day in the Back End of Beyond

July 25, 2007 Monday

We had our “companions” meeting in the morning to see the available tours. There was only one that was reasonable for our group. It was a trip to a cave and then a horse drawn carriage ride through the forest. The rest took 8 to 10 hours each and weren’t good for people that were attached to others that weren’t on the trip.

The schedule here is: Get up at 7. Breakfast from 8 to 9. Chuck goes to conference and I wander, blog, read, knit, etc. Lunch is from about 12:45 to 2 and everyone eats together. Chuck goes back to the conference till about 6:30 and I wander, blog, read, knit, etc. Most nights we are on our own for dinner. There are about 5 restaurants in the town – most of them serving the same type of Eastern European food – meat, potatoes, garlic soup.

Since the conference is the biggest event in the town, we keep running into each other, so have dinner or sit and talk etc. after dinner.

Bedtime. 3am Chuck wakes up, gets up, turns on computer and lights and wanders around for an hour or so.

Lunch today was Broccoli soup, pork cutlets with sauerkraut, potatoes “American”, cabbage salad, cake.

I visited 2 of the museums in town. The first is billed as the “Creative culture in the Spis region”. What it is is a bunch of really bad paintings and a few jugs and plates. I went in and paid my entrance fee. The girl unlocked the door to the “museum” and turned on the lights. It was on several floors, so I wandered slowly, perusing each piece, just in case there was a hidden gem. I guess that she thought that I was taking too much time, because after awhile she came and started turning off the lights. As she was relocking the door, she asked if I wanted to visit the House of Master Paval? Yes, I was planning on that. I needed to buy the ticket from her and someone would escort me across the square. Master Paval is a BIG deal in this town. He is really their only claim to fame. I bought, was escorted and as we walked across the street, my guide asked if I had enough time to see the short film about the town and Master Paval? I told her that I had all the time in the world.

The film was quite good, but at the end the sound cuts out, so the girl came in and said that’s it. Then I again looked very carefully at all of the exhibits and read all of the explanations. Master Paval carved all of the statues and altar pieces in the cathedral in the town. His house had copies of the things. Since it was hard to see them in the dim church, and because some of them were far away, it was good to see what he had been doing. She started to turn off the lights, too.

I went back to the room for a nap. Chuck’s night time wanderings have been disturbing my sleep.

We had dinner at the hotel again: Cucumber salad, turkey with bacon & onions, potato croquettes and cabbage salad.

We walked around the square for ice cream and sat and watched the town drunks stagger down the street. It was a couple. The woman was quite loud. The man gave up and passed out on the grass right across the street from us.

We went back to the hotel and chatted with some guys in the atrium.