Journey to Europe! June 1

Hello Again!

After about a week in the states (split between my hoMes MI and MN), I'm off abroad again. This time the destination is Prague, Czech Republic (after a quick stop in Toronto, Canada). 

Note to future self—> packing for 10 weeks the night before tends to be a “bad idea.” The result of this decision included potentially overpacking and very little sleep, more of a nap, before heading to the airport. The sleep deprivation (and beautiful sunny weather) may also result in you setting your sweatshirt on the railing at home and not realizing that you don't have it until you board your plane. All in all, after saying “Goodby” to my dad and furry sister, mom took me to the airport before work. Enjoy the obligatory pre-departure airport photo!

Once at the gate in MSP I had a very scary beginning to my travels. The announcement overhead was “Flight blah blah to Toronto has been Canceled.” Probably the best way to start my day, right?! Luckily after a few minutes, a second announcement clarified that the flight that was canceled from my gate was actually original departure at 6am (my flight was 10am). So, I guess I dodged bullet one of the attempt to get to Prague! The all so re-assuring reason for the 6am Air Canada flight to be canceled was none other than a mechanical failure that prevented the landing wheels from re-entering the plane following take-off. Again, I’m posting this so it is obvious that the flight I was on clearly landed in Canada safely. 

Leg two of the flight was Toronto to Prague and then off to the hostel before starting my day. Total flight time was about ten hours, about a total of 20 hours. After getting back from India this is nothing. Unfortunately this time I wasn’t as successful at sleeping on the flight. Regardless I did learn something new— Air Canada Rouge doesn’t have screens for in-flight entertainment. Instead, you have to use your personal device to stream from their wifi based system. An interesting concept and one that I would bet has proven extremely beneficial from a business standpoint. Next time I fly I will bring a charger because after watching Casablanca I only had about another 1-2 hours left of approximate battery time on my laptop for the remaining 6 hours of my flight. I tried to get some sleep since I’ll be landing at 7am, but if I barely was able to dose off. Luckily, I did bring three research papers to read before my internship to learn more about polymers and hydrogels for bone tissue scaffolding, so I had plenty of reading material to try to comprehend on the plane!

I successfully navigated my first bus to metro trip in order to be in walking distance from my hostel (with my backpacking bag and suitcase mind you)! There were crazy escalators in the metro (I'm not convinced this picture even does it justice, its seriously almost a 45 degree incline)! It’s nice to be finally in the right spot. I’m planning on staying local to our hostel as I wait for Anna and finally am able to move into my room this afternoon.