This would be a good time to mention, that I am under strict orders from my producer (Sandra) not to spoil any of the story details from the “Jonne Project.” Fortunately there are plenty of other interesting stories from the travel, sightseeing, and vacation aspect that I can tell you. I should also mention that we chose to stay in Prague because it was in a central location to our 3 main filming destinations. Each destination was just over an hour away from Prague. So the first order of business was to rent a car. Driving in Europe is not recommended for most Americans. While all of Europe does drive on the right side of the road (except England) the signs are very different and some of the customs are different. But, I lived in Italy three years, and Ava has been to Europe frequently, so driving in CZ was not going to be a problem.
Now that we were unpacked, our batteries charged, cupboard and fridge stocked we were ready for our first day of filming. The breakfast cereal with buttermilk was quite a rude awakening. We ended up eating the cereal dry. We left our apartments, with our bulging backpacks loaded with equipment and walked down the streets to the nearest subway. From there we went to the end of the green line and caught a shuttle bus out to the airport and rented a car. This took nearly two hours, but soon we had loaded up our little black Skoda sedan and we were on our way north to Usti nad Labem.
The first location that we needed to find was on the outskirts of town, down some rather small country roads. Sandra had turn-by-turn directions and we did a good job finding all the streets until we got to the last road called “unnamed road”. We went by it twice, but finally found what turned out to be a little dirt field-road, which explains the unnamed part. We bravely inched the little Skoda over the ruts in the road praying we would not meet anyone, because it was definitely a one lane road. But since there were no signs of civilization, we figured the odds were pretty good we were the only people around. We found our first location and got our shot. We packed up and headed back into town to see if any other locations looked familiar to mom. But so much has changed she didn’t recognize anything. The Elbe River passes through the town and there is new modern bridge which we managed to drive across.
Driving in Usti nad Labem from Jim Walker on Vimeo.
We then moved onto the small town of Lovosice for more filming and a good dinner. Then it was back to apartment in Prague.
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