After a grueling sequence of flights and layovers I arrived in Praha in the evening, greeted by Kristin and almost immediately whisked away to the pub to resume my love/hate relationship with Czech beer. Ondra joined us later, convinced (read: suggested) me to take a shot of malinovice, a true shock to the senses. The night ended shortly after.

The following morning we drove to Solnice (sol meaning salt, and so named due to the town’s origins as a convenient stopping point along an ancient salt trade route), picked up some snow shoes and cross-country skis, and headed to Orlickè hory, a mountain located at the Czech/Poland border. We were actually stradling the border: Ondra’s phone kept receiving text messages from his carrier saying “Welcome to Poland!”  “Welcome to the Czech Republic!”

We strapped into our snow-shoes and skis and headed to Velká Deštná, the mountain’s summit:

and then it got really cold and we went home.