Road Trip Leaving Berlin, Germany

Scooting past Dresden, past…
Wake up at 5 am, shower, finish packing, walk the Fritz dog and be on our way by 6:15am.  It is early enough to get through Berlin within 1/2 hour without any traffic problems – direction Dresden.

We pass through the Spreewald of Brandenburg, making note to stop at the Schloss Lübbenau next time, a royal palace castle on an island which is now used as a hotel.  Next we fly by the cutoff for the famous domed indoor beach themepark Tropical Islands.

As we pass by acres of beautiful sunflower fields, many points of interest are suggested with the brown roadside signs, but we do not have sufficient time this time; we will break them into short trips in the future.

There are lots of rest areas where you can take a bathroom break, rest, snack and or picnic.  Our dog Fritz loves these breaks!  As you saw from my last blog, we took a trunk full of groceries – water, sodas, breads, pastas, fruit, carrots, and 2 small coolers with cheeses and meats.
One of our earlier stops, we had a fruit breakfast, drank some water and of course let Fritz go for a run.

Also noted as we flew past is the Schloss Schönfeld, known as Germany’s magical castle in the Saxony area of Dresden, followed by the baroque Schloss Moritzburg.  Yes, this could be a castle tour coming on a trip near us!

At 8:14 am we veer off towards Dresden, Germany and Prag, Czech Republic.  By 8:35 am we enter through the highway tunnels and wave bye bye to Dresden, vowing to come back some day and see the city and all of her attractions.  Past the Schloss Wessenstein and Schloss Pillnitz (more castles!), the Saxon Baroque Gardens dated 1727 and then entering the beautiful rolling hills of the Swiss Saxony known for hiking.

As we pass the picturesque town of Pirna, we see a sign indicating that Prag is just 117 km away.  We stop at rest area Am Heidenholz to get the obligatory vignette (highway permit) for the Czech Republic – Cost: €12.50 for 1 to 10 days (30 days €17.50). They accept payment in Euros or Czech Koruna / Crowns and give you the choice of either as change.  Pretty much immediately leave Germany ?? and enter Czech Republic ?? ; it is 9:30 am.

All road signs are in Czech only.  We stopped at the first gas station we came to, but it was over full with people so we left and went to the next petro station (9:51 am) which was much more relaxed; although we did not go in, there is also a McDonalds here and wifi in the bistro. Gas is slightly cheaper than in Germany so we filled the car which needed 26.6 l at 31.20 CZK (€1.20/litre or USD$1.40/litre) for a total of 829.90 CKZ .

At 10:15 am we hit our first traffic jam of the trip due to construction / lane closure, but it quickly opened up again 9 minutes later, however that was short lived and we drove right into the next jam as we realized we were on the outskirts of Prag.  At 10:44 am as we were still making our way slowly through Prag, it started to rain.  We stopped at a McDonalds where we ordered 2 clubhouse menus (sandwich, soda, fries) for a total of 312.00 Czech crown / €12.  By 11:32 am we were on the road again with full stomachs!

11:57 am and we are finally exiting Prag – destination Vienna (Wien), Austria!!!