Travels of the Princess and the Pea

The Adventures of the Princess and the Pea or how camping out in a stranger’s living room could turn out to be the highlight of your trip.

It wasn’t until bedtime that my butt hit the bed with a thud. My husband had already commented that the beds were too short, to which I had blithely replied, “just an optical illusion” created by the oversized Euro-style pillows. But as I lie here now, old bones complaining, on what can only be described as a piece of corrugated cardboard on a hollow plywood box, with my feet hanging over the end of the bed, I have to admit that he’s right.

We are driving through central Europe with our Czech-ex-pat friend Peter, meeting and often staying with his network of friends. Since we've been traveling in what I've come to think of as the ‘Central European way’, I have found myself bunking in all manner of rooms and beds: some good and some, well, not so much.

But the experiences we have, and the people we meet along the way more than make up for it.
Previously, when we’d stayed in small hotels and kept to our family unit, never really getting to mix with the locals, we'd treasured any interaction, no matter how small. Glimpses snatched through open doorways often left me feeling slightly like a voyeur, but there is little opportunity for mixing when you don't have an “in” to the community. Peter was our ‘in’.

He picked us up in Prague in the Skoda he keeps with relatives in a nearby Czech town where he grew up. The trunk was full of pears from this cousin’s tree and fresh bread. First stop, Chesky Krumlov where we had no 'in', but garnered a castle view window none the less.

Our destination, however, was Lago Scura. Damp and cool always describes our favorite Agriturismo in northern Italy in October. Just outside Cremona, the dairy farm cum cheese factory that looked like a miniature castle. We wouldn’t stay anywhere else. The two lumpy single beds were adequate, but it’s the view from our shuttered windows of the three-hundred-year-old tower and crenelated roofline that I dream about when I’m back home.
We bought some organic cheese from the store on the premises, huge chunks cut from large rounds. Cheese for the road, “and we’ll take some as gifts,” Peter said.

“Gifts for whom?” I wondered vaguely.

Peter’s friends, Volodja and Marie, as it turned out, who lived in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Marie is a French-Canadian ex-pat and happily accepted the tin of maple syrup that Peter had carried from Quebec just for her.

Ljubljana is a delightful city known for beautiful buildings and, we were assured, over-priced and inadequate accommodation. Our generous hosts insisted we must stay with them in their elegant, historic, second and third floor apartment. Afternoon turned into evening as we sat talking on the balcony that overlooked the river and up to the castle on the hill. Accents were flying, French, Slovenian, Croatian and Czech. Lucky for us they settled on English as their common language.

My husband and I would sleep in their expansive living room on a blow-up bed; more comfortable, they assured us, than the pullout couch. We sat smiling and nodding while the screaming electric pump did the work, temporarily silencing all possible conversation.
It was very comfortable, but it was mid-October and, until we reached the mountains of Slovakia, we found that no one had turned on the heat so, with only one blanket between us, we cuddled together for warmth.

But for breakfast there were fresh, warm, bakery croissants, our cheese, and the strong coffee that our host continuously made, one tiny, delicious, pot-full of after another. That’s when I discovered that by sharing a stranger’s home for a night, there’s a good chance you leave the next day as friends for life.

Zelko was another guest that night, and he insisted we return with him to Zagreb. It was an unplanned stop for us, but he would not take no for an answer, so we grabbed the chance to see the city with a native. It was on our way to Budapest, we could stay at his apartment – a generous offer – how could we refuse? He himself would stay at his girlfriend’s apartment.

He took us to his parents’ apartment first thing, and we gave given them a big piece of stinky cheese and a bag of coffee when we arrived. It turned out that was not nearly enough to repay them for the generous meals we received in return. Each meal, including breakfast, began, in our honor, with a toast of Slivovitz, the traditional plum brandy that burns all the way down. It was followed by Turkish coffee, strong enough to stand a spoon up in. His mother showed me how she made it: boil the water in a small pot, then pour in the powdered coffee until “you feel some resistance when you stir it with the spoon.” It made Starbucks espresso pale by comparison.

The next morning we all agreed that our host had never slept or eaten at his own apartment himself. He didn’t even have a bed! – which was something that we had somehow failed to notice during our whirlwind orientation to the small bachelor pad. My husband and I slept on the pull down couch, five and a half feet long with arms at both ends, and so narrow it required “spooning” and turning in unison all night long. It was, however, debatably better than the cloth cot with one inch of foam that Peter drew.

But how we enjoyed meals with his family!

This pattern of open-armed hospitality continued, through Hungary to Slovakia, where I now sit on my box of a bed in the middle of the night, unable to sleep, writing this missive. And I’m sure the hospitality will be repeated in spades at our next stop, Peter’s home town of Olomouc in the Czech Republic.

Staying with friends is a central European tradition, and sharing what food you have is a must. Although we’d given up multi-starred hotels for a chance to camp in someone’s living room, those warm, insider experiences definitely made this trip special.

We never made it up the hill to the castle in Ljubljiana, but by meeting our hosts, and their family and friends, we learned more about the culture than we would have wandering the city alone.

And now that we have friends there, I’m sure we will be back. But next time I'll have an extra suitcase of my own for coffee, cheese and maple syrup.

In the meantime, I'll share with you our visits to these interesting, sometimes out-of-the-way places in Central Europe. Stay tuned for future installments.