The train from Paris to Krakow stops in Prague, capital of the Czech Republic. I had my suspicions about this city, partly inspired by a postcard I'd found on the floor of the Frankfurt airport, dropped by a teenage girl who babbled ridiculously in thick, frilly handwriting about the cheap drinks and cool architecture of the Czech capital. Prague's architecture is indeed splendid, but its atmosphere is spoiled by the adolescent hordes that have been pouring in since the country's Velvet Revolution of 1989. Day-trippers come from Germany and Austria, and weekenders arrive by the bus load from France and Belgium. Russians, Poles, and Hungarians all flock here for holiday.
Summer can be unbearable, with some of the worst crowds on the continent.
Summer is also when the Americans come. Armed with Let's Go guides and Eurail passes bought by mom and dad for graduation, they converge like some gnarly-haired version of the Soviet army on the old town square, emptying their backpacks around the fountains and making charcoal sketches of the bridge towers. Quiet and austere, the medieval town of Krakow in southwestern Poland is, for now, still uninfected by tourist mobs or Western-style glitz. I arrived there at sunrise, tired and thirsty, hung-over from the frenzy of Prague. It was a cold Wednesday morning in March - the first day of Spring.