Eger, Hungary

Whew! We're back from our 3-week trip through Central Europe. I gave up on blogging from the road to leave more time for travel experiences. Great trip despite the weather, which was almost comically disappointing after Prague. All of Europe was experiencing unseasonably cool and rainy weather in September. But the rain seemed to follow us around in particular.

Here are some pics from Eger, Hungary, a lovely small town where we had a chance to catch our breath a bit after busy days in Prague and Krakow. Eger is where the Magyars held off the Turks against extraordinary odds (hence the murals). In addition to chilling out at our hotel -- well, warming up -- we saw a delightful organ concert at the Eger Cathedral, a Marzipan Museum, and the local college's Astronomical Museum, which has a large camera obscura on its rooftop. By moving the rooftop mirrors around we were able to watch the street level activity of nearly the entire town in surprising detail, kind of like a live TV feed. The vendor at the marketplace standing next to Ann is wearing a Vikings cap for some reason. He was happy to learn that we were from Minnesota, especially since it helped get us to buy a couple of pears off of him.