Day 9

This morning we woke up bright and early to prepare for the last day of our international trip. Breakfast consisted of a small array of foods and beverages on the otherside of the courtyard from our hostel. We were briefed before recieving our packs for the wide game. After which we rushed off to prepare ourselves, we collected our belongings and headed off to the first location, a short walk from our hostel.

The games began at 10am as the clock chimed, the 13 teams sped off to different sectors on the map, the aim of the game was to avoid the 'guards' and discover and collect codes which gave us points. The general public, unknowingly took part in the game, some of which were more useful than they know...

We ran around Budapest for two hours earning points and successfully evaded the capture of one set of guards but we weren't so lucky with the second lot as they caught up with one of the leaders. The game finished at twelve with 103 sweaty guides, before everyone split to enjoy the final afternoon of the trip.

After enjoying a quick lunch at Subway, an ice-cream shaped like a flower and some souvenir shopping; we hopped on the underground towards the thermal baths. Here we enjoyed 2 hours of relaxing in 37 degrees Celsius pools, we took the underground once more ready for the closing / award ceremony.

All the groups gathered in the courtyard to be seated with other guides from the Midland's. The meal was buffet style and passed by quickly, soon enough we were gathered outside ready for awards. Staffs_slayers (us) won the 'super service project' award and out of the 13 groups we came 3rd overall. We then headed off to bed ready to wake up to travel at 3am the next morning. All in all our adventure was a good one making friends and travelling Europe together.

Day 8

Today we finished our adventure in Vienna by visiting the Schönbrunn Palace Gardens along with the zoo. Everyone was entrigued by the giant panda and some loved the polar bear and penguins.

We were going to go in the maze also , however most people decided that they wanted to remain in the zoo until we had to leave. We then returned to our apartment to retrieve our bags and go to the train station via the underground. We then had a little spare time and as we hadn't got anything but an ice cream at the zoo , we instead had McDonald's while our leaders had cake.

On the train to Budapest we managed to fully complete our story, well the draft anyways, and also finished all the drawings that matched up to our stories plot. When we got to the hostel via taxi, we found our rooms before setting out to get some food. Most of us got something to do with pasta.

Following that we travelled along the side of the river to reach a memorial for all the Jewish people that were executed along its banks. Iron shoes line the edge the wall , male and female - adults and children. It's representing how they had to take their clothes and shoes off beforehand being shot and thrown in the river. After that we headed back to our hostel where we sat and finished writing it into our book in order to hand it in tomorrow before the game of hide and seek.

Day 7

Today began with breakfast at the café round the corner then finishing packing/tidying to leave.  We got taxis to the train station (we'd decided it was too complicated to sort out trams or buses and too far to walk with our heavy bags) then had a bit of time to visit the station's shops. Ostrava doesn't have many tourist type shops so this was our only opportunity.

We successfully caught the train, although there was a slight issue as we'd reserved 2 seats that don't exist! Fortunately the conductor sorted it out and we were able to sit together.  The girls thought the train was like the Harry Potter train as they were sat in a compartment with a closing door.

Once we arrived in Vienna we navigated to the apartment via the underground, a bendy bus and walking.  We were all incredibly relieved to discover that our apartment was in the 1st floor.  Our legs are worn out after 4 flights of stairs to the apartment in Krakow and 4 flights of stairs to the hotel room in Ostrava.  In fact we've renamed our group '4 flights of stairs'!  We're keeping everything crossed that we're not on the 4th floor in Budapest.  Our apartment is very homely.

After a quick sit down we went back on the Ubahn to the Nachtmarkt. Here we did a bit more souvenir shopping and enjoyed an ice-cream.  Back on the underground to Prater where we (except Sue) took in the sights of the city on the enormous Ferris wheel. The girls then split up from us leaders to enjoy their rides and grab something to eat.  We had a relaxed 'local' meal at a restaurant that sold more than burgers, chips and pizza!

The girls enjoyed their rides then we made our way back. We arrived back later than expected so the girls have gone straight to bed which is why we've written this blog.

Sue and Dawn

Day 6

The day started off with breakfast at Alibabas and then we walked for 12 minutes to our suprise. Our suprise was a water park where we spent all day. There was a water slide and a hot tub along with a diving board.

We all had fun jumping in off the diving board into the cool blue water. At 1 o'clock we got out and and had lunch but it wasn't long before we jumped back into the water and started playing again.  A couple of hours later we got out again and brought an ice cold drink from the shop and sat by the pool. Then we decided we would go on the slide a few times and then have a shower. We then walk back to the apartment via the supermarket to buy tomorrow's lunch. We are now deciding what to have for tea.

Day 5

Today was the day that we have finally moved to Ostrava. We got up early to have our breakfast of Polish cereal, Mleko (milk). Double checking that we had everyone's things, we were on our way to the train station.

The journey was long and hard, the road was winding and weaving and the route was complicated (we got lost). Once we had finally arrived at the train station, we had to squeeze our bags through a tight gap and then climb through to get to the platform on time to catch our train.

We launched ourselves into the train and hurriedly found our seats. Bags on racks and in footwells the 10 of us crushed in as if we were in a clown car.

Four hours later, we all peeled out of the carriage like sardines out of a can. We were finally in Ostrava and it was hotter outside of the carriage than inside of the tightly packed train. We all clambered up on to the top floor of the station to buy a ticket for our next train.

Once we had our tickets we went down to the platform to wait for our train. Trains came and went but not a single sign of our train for a while. Finally a train rolled up and we showed our tickets to the conducter but he told us that we couldn't get on because they were for the wrong train company.

We found the correct platform and a train rolled up but by the time we realised that it was the right train, the doors had closed and the train was barreling off in the opposite direction. We aborted the mission and decided to take a taxi!

Once we had located some taxis, we split into 3 groups and went in our respective taxis. A few minutes later, we had arrived at our hotel (and alot quicker than by train).

Once we had arrived at our hotel, the older girls and leaders had to fill in some forms. We then dragged ourselves and our bags up the 4 flights of stairs to the apartment. When we got to the top, we could hardly open the door at the top.

After we eventually broke into our apartment, we all took our things up to our rooms and we prepared to head out again to find the infamous astronomical puppet clock. We waited for the clock to chime 6pm so that we could see the wooden puppet show which happens every even hour.

On the way to find our dinner for the evening, we spent some time on an excercise park. After we had done our excercise for the day, we went to find food and we came across a resturant called the red lion, pizza and pasta.

We all ate our pizza and pasta, which was very nice and we headed back to our apartment. Some of the group ran up the stairs and then realised that the person with the keys was still at the bottom of the stairs because they didn't want to run. We then struggled to open the door again because it got jammed.

And here we are now writing our story and finishing this blog.

Day 4

Today, we woke up early so we could visit Schindler's Factory ( a museum about the life of Jews in Poland before, during and after the war- including the German's invasion and the ghettos they lived in.) Schindler was a German Nazi who took control of a half-functioning Jewish-owned factory. Jews were being taken to concentration camps,such as Auschwitz to die but instead he bought them and used their labour in his factory. Also prior to the museum, we met two separate groups of Italian scouts, luckily for us someone in both could somewhat understand our language. Following that we had lunch when it began to rain so we quickly finished and left to go to meet with our tour person for the doll making. As we were children, we instead got ice cream at the beginning rather than beer before going to the live studio to make the dolls. At the studio we made the dolls from scraps of fabric and wool/string. Some of us made women, some made men and all looked brilliant. Some of us refused to tell our wishes that we made the doll with, partly because if you tell a wish it won't come true and mostly for the fact we didn't actually have one. Some wished for safe passage during the rest of our trip. The place is all about helping the homeless and such. They make soup on Sundays and invite them to help out and join workshops to change their constant routine. After that we jumped on a tram to visit the leaky cauldron, a Harry potter themed coffeehouse, where we had iced butterbeers, mochas or crackling lemonade. We then found our way to the hard rock cafe where we waited a while for a table, I mean there are 10 of us. In the meantime we sat and edited this blog and our continuous story...

8 very tired Guides finished their dinner at Hard Rock Café then asked to go to bed without a pudding.

Day 3

Today we had a polish style breakfast which contained a selection of different bread, and granola with Polish quark. After breakfast we went to the Wawel Royal castle and visited the dragons den before marvelling at the Wawel dragon who blows fire every 5 minutes. We enjoyed a quick snack of crisps in a thunderstorm, then continued on to a souvenir shop and edulged in polish ice-cream.
After our exploration of the castle and shops we headed to CiuCiu sweet shop, where we learnt the making of rock and made our own lollies. We then made our way to an illusion museum where we became rather intrigued with the interactive displays. To en our day we headed back to our apartment and ate a yummy meal of vegetable spaghetti Bolognese.

Day Two

After a breakfast of toast, we all gathered our belongings and walked to the back to back houses (had to reroute due to road works). We arrived to a warm welcome from the team and soon set to work. We got split into groups and each completed multiple cleaning tasks in the fascinating houses. Each house's interior was designed like it would have been in a different time period. Surprisingly, the team seemed to enjoy the community project and finding out about the past. We said our goodbyes to the volunteers and found a place to eat our now melted sandwiches we made earlier. It was then time to head to Birmingham New Street station to catch a train to Birmingham International. A shirt change and shuttle bus later we arrived at the airport to catch our flight to Krakow in Poland. We checked in our bags and headed to security which resulted in three body and two bag checks. After bags were reclaimed and we could continue we headed through to the food court where we enjoyed a burger king. Before we knew it, it was time to head to the gate and board the plane. The plane landed and we all got off to get onto a shuttle bus for a short ride to the airport. Once arrived we quickly went through border control and collected our bags and were greeted by a friendly women who was going to take us to our accomodation that we are staying in in Krakow. The team split between two cars for the around twenty minute car journey to reach the spacious apartment which we are now settled into now, ready for the adventures that await in Krakow.

Day One

We started the day at Warwick Castle, where we met the other groups we're competing against. After a friendly welcome we began our challenges. As a team, we started by going around Warwick and doing a quiz. As well as the quiz , we also had tasks to complete and prizes to collect. The first challenge was finding the "porridge pot" which was related to the story Goldilocks: there we received a sporfe (spoon/knife/fork combination). Later we climbed to the top of the conquers fortress after been frantically waved at by leaders at the top and received a jelly bean prize after answering a trivia question about the date of the building we stood in. We visited the bear tower shortly after , taking a picture with the trunk and shackles used to restrain former bears from ages past. Following that we trekked up the steep, small-surfaced spiral staircase then had to agonisingly had to walk back down realising that Rapunzel was not in her tower but lay at the bottom with friendship bracelets for us. The maze was mayhem but in the end we got a badge to show our effort. We returned to the event marquee for lunch slightly early so by the time we finished people were still eating , we took this in stride and did the gingerbread men characters (many resembling Antonio (single Pringle man )) before enjoying them and moving on. We had one task left , puss in boots' Welly wanging. It resulted in achievement and a near miss for the judge. We then sat and played ludo before being moved onto the coaches to Birmingham train station and Birmingham airport where we made our way through crowds and trains in order to arrive at our apartment for the night. There we played another game, stocked up on food for the following day and finally began to write the first piece to our story.

Once upon a time

Our story will soon begin.

Afternoon tea

#Staffs_Slayers show their nice side and serve afternoon tea to friends and family.

Planning our trip

We are a group of girl Guides taking part in the Midland Region Fairy tales and Scary tales International Challenge. We have 8 days to get to Budapest.