Czech Republic/Poland/Hungary/Austria
The Best of Central Europe: Krakow, Budapest, Vienna, Prague
Program No. 12259RJ
Immerse yourself in the exquisite artistry of four of Europe’s great cities, gaining a comprehensive understanding of historical monuments, cultural treasures and world-class art.
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18 days
17 nights
39 meals
16B 11L 12D
1
In Transit to Program
In Flight
4
Auschwitz & Birkenau
Krakow
6
Welcome to Budapest
Budapest
8
Szabó Ervin Library, Downtown Pest
Budapest
10
Welcome to Vienna
Vienna
14
Welcome to Prague
Prague
16
Architecture of Prague
Prague
18
Program Concludes
Prague
At a Glance
From the elegance of a Chopin polonaise in Krakow to the grandeur of the Habsburg’s summer palace in Vienna, embark on an exquisite journey to learn about Central Europe’s most artistically rich cities and the great thinkers and creative geniuses who called them home. Private concerts, viewings of world-class art collections and in-depth discussion of some of Europe’s leading intellectuals create a detailed portrait of these royal capital cities.
Activity Level
Keep the Pace
Please note that although the activity level of this program is Keep the Pace, it is a long program, traveling to four different countries over the span of 18 days. Walking up to 5 miles or up to 5 hours per day with periods of standing, often in crowded areas. Terrain includes cobblestones, city streets and uneven ground; short uphill walks; standing at museums; many unavoidable stairs; use of public transportation.
Small Group
Love to learn and explore in a small-group setting? These adventures offer small, personal experiences with groups of 13 to 24 participants.
Best of all, you’ll…
- Enjoy a private concert at the Strahov Monastery and explore the library.
- Admire the illuminated city of Budapest on an evening river voyage along the Danube River, passing such important sights as parliament, Chain Bridge and Castle Hill.
- Explore Schönbrunn Palace, the former imperial summer residence and one of the most important cultural monuments in Austria.
Featured Expert
All trip experts
Petra Bidlasová
Since 1997, Petra Bidlasová has been sharing her knowledge of Prague with lifelong learners from around the world. With an education in art history, she is currently working on her thesis on contemporary African art and post-colonial theory. For more than 10 years, she has been a lecturer of the Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at the National Gallery in Prague. In 2013, she became a professor of Modern Czech Art at CIEE Study Center for American students.
Please note: This expert may not be available for every date of this program.
Petra Bidlasová
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Since 1997, Petra Bidlasová has been sharing her knowledge of Prague with lifelong learners from around the world. With an education in art history, she is currently working on her thesis on contemporary African art and post-colonial theory. For more than 10 years, she has been a lecturer of the Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at the National Gallery in Prague. In 2013, she became a professor of Modern Czech Art at CIEE Study Center for American students.
Dita Hradecká
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Dita studied piano and musicology and began her career in the musical journalism field, first at the magazine “Harmonie” and then at a classical music radio station. She was a music critic for the daily newspaper Lidove noviny and has taught courses at NYU Prague. She is currently the PR and Marketing Manager for the Prague Philharmonic. “I believe music is one of the most wonderful things in life and a deeper knowledge of it can only increase our pleasure of listening,” says Dita.
Annamaria Orla-Bukowska
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Annamaria Orla-Bukowska is a social anthropologist teaching at the Institute of Sociology at Jagiellonian University in Kraków, where she earned a Ph.D. American born and raised, she has lived in Poland since 1985. Her general field of research is majority-minority relations, cultural pluralism, and collective identities. She has co-authored "Rethinking Poles and Jews: Troubled Past, Brighter Future," as well as a chapter on Polish collective memory in "The Politics of Memory in Postwar Europe.”
Robert Siuta-Romanowski
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Robert Siuta-Romanowski was born in Krakow, the cultural capital of Poland. Surrounded by art and history at a young age, he decided to study art, theology and public relations at Jagiellonian University in Krakow. Robert is now finishing his Ph.D. in medieval symbolism and his research interests focus on the connections between science, faith, and art.
Markéta Hegarová
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After graduating from high school, Marketa worked for a British travel agency, specializing in guest relations, transport and group travel. Following that, she worked for the American company Thermo King in Prague and also began working as a group leader herself. She has passed exams in the special areas of architecture, art and the history of the Czech Republic. When not leading travelers around her home country, Marketa enjoys reading, traveling and listening to music.
Jana Pivonkova
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Jana Pivonková was born in Tábor in Southern Bohemia, Czech Republic. After studying at a hotel school in Prague, she worked at a travel agency in Cedok for 14 years and also organized sporting events for soccer, tennis, and ice hockey. Jana has been leading English- and German-speaking groups around Prague and abroad for over 30 years, and has worked with Road Scholar for over 20 years. She loves history, gardening, dancing and the accordion, and her travels include Cuba, Egypt, Tunisia and Japan.
Anna Pivonková
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Anna Pivonková grew up in Prague and studied German at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University in Prague. Anna is a passionate drummer – she plays the West African drum djembe and accompanies African dance lessons. Apart from music, she is interested in history, architecture and modern art, especially if related to Prague. She is a licensed Prague group leader who loves meeting new people, good conversation and traveling.
Julia Lasek
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Julia Lasek was born in Tarnobrzeg, a town in south-east Poland. Although the neighborhood she grew up in was modern, there was an old Jewish cemetery in its midst. She pursued a degree in Jewish studies at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, from which she graduated in 2004. During her studies, she learned Hebrew and Yiddish, wrote her thesis on Jewish architects in pre-war Krakow, and studied at the faculty of international studies and politics. In 2005, Julia became a professional city leader.
Karl Husa
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Dr. Karl Husa studied at the University of Vienna and graduated in 1983 with a PhD on internal migration, residential mobility and suburbanization processes in the Vienna Region. Since 1996 he has been a professor for human geography at the Department of Geography and Regional Research of the University of Vienna. His research interests are the intersections of tourism and migration; population geography; spatial patterns of internal and international migration; and development studies, with a regional focus on Europe, Southeast Asia and the developing world.
Lisa Zeiler
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Born in 1966 in Vienna, Lisa Zeiler studied English and Art History at the University of Vienna and the University of Toronto, Canada. Since 2001 she has worked as a qualified Group Leader in Vienna, specializing in art and museum visits. She also organizes and teaches in Austria's most extensive guide training course. In addition, she works part time for an institute of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Lisa sees herself as an ambassador of Austrian culture, history and character.
Felix Bergmeister
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Felix studied geography and economic education combined with English and American studies at the University of Vienna, where he also received his Ph.D. in human geography. He is a full-time researcher and lecturer at the university's Department of Geography and Regional Research. His research interests include Southeast Asia, cultural studies, tourism studies and critical development studies. An avid traveler, Felix spent two years on an around-the-world motorcycle trip, and is known for his penchant for remote destinations like Madagascar, La Mayotte and St. Helena.
Michaela Janecková
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Michaela studied architecture at the Czech Technical University in Prague and theory and history of architecture, arts and design at the University of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague. She now teaches Czech architecture and design at Charles University to U.S. students as well as a contemporary architecture course at the Architectural Institute in Prague, a school for international students. Michaela plans to finish her PhD theses at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague in 2020, focusing on Czech postwar architecture.
Evy Pranter
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Evy Pranter grew up in Salzburg, the birthplace of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. After finishing school, she settled in Vienna to study French and art history at Vienna University. She immediately fell in love with the city, with its rich heritage of history, arts, architecture, and music. After working in various tourism jobs and raising her children, Evy started her career as a local expert, which has continued for over two decades. Her specialty is the period around 1900 when the city exploded with new ideas in architecture, arts, medicine, music, and more.
Gergo Agoston
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Gergo "Greg" Agoston, a native of Budapest, is an experienced travel leader and a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Manchester with a special focus on contemporary Hungarian politics and political history. He holds a B.A. in Chinese studies from ELTE University, and two M.A. degrees in politics and political economy from the University of Manchester. As an avid traveler, Greg lived in mainland China and the UK for over a decade, working in education and travel. After running his own company for several years, Greg decided to pursue his love of politics, culture, and history and started a Ph.D.
Matthias Hink
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Matthias Hink studied music at university, and currently plays viola as a member of the State Opera Orchestra. He also plays often with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra.
Suggested Reading List
(27 books)
Visit the Road Scholar Bookshop
You can find many of the books we recommend at the Road Scholar store on bookshop.org, a website that supports local bookstores.
The Best of Central Europe: Krakow, Budapest, Vienna, Prague
Program Number: 12259
Danubia, A Personal History of Habsburg Europe
Winder, author of Germania (GER270), considers the legacy of the Habsburg Europe in this charmingly digressive history and travelogue.
The Habsburgs, Embodying Empire
With skillful scholarship and engaging style, Wheatcroft reveals the history of this family of eccentric monarchs.
Bury Me Standing
This marvelous portrait of the Roma, also known as the Gypsies, offers insight into their music, foods, religions and folk traditions and also examines their influential but complex relationship with Eastern Europe.
Dvorak and His World
A fascinating view of the Czech composer's personal life and his influence on the world around him.
Mozart, A Life
Challenging myths surrounding Mozart’s health, religion and relationships, biographer Paul Johnson shows the great composer’s lasting impact on the musical world with insight.
God's Playground Vols. 1 & 2
The most comprehensive survey of Polish history available in English, God's Playground demonstrates Poland's importance in European history from medieval times to the present. Abandoning the traditional nationalist approach to Polish history, Norman Davies instead stresses the country's rich multinational heritage and places the development of the Jewish German, Ukrainian, and Lithuanian communities firmly within the Polish context.
Central Europe Map
This colorful regional European map, like the sister map Europe Grand Tour (EUR185), covers from Paris and Amsterdam to Vienna, Prague, Warsaw, Budapest, Rome and Dubrovnik.
Vienna, A Traveler's Literary Companion
Organized by neighborhood, these 15 alluring tales introduce both the city and its writers, including Arthur Schnitzler, Robert Musil, Stefan Zweig and even Franz Kafka, who had a long and complicated association with the city.
Prague, A Traveler's Literary Companion
This anthology of 24 vivid stories by Czech writers, both contemporary and well-known, brings the city, history, spirit and people to life.
Open Letters, Selected Writings: 1965 - 1990
This inspired anthology of writings by the Czech poet-president Vaclav Havel collects 25 essays, letters and speeches written between 1965 and 1990, including those that directly influenced the Polish Solidarity movement.
A Time of Gifts
Fermor effortlessly interweaves anecdote, history and culture in this exuberant account of a walk from Holland, up the Rhine and down the Danube, through Germany, Prague and Austria in 1933. Written not in the moment, but 40 years later, the accumulation of time and experience gives the book particular poignancy.
Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944-1956
In the much-anticipated follow-up to her Pulitzer Prize-winning Gulag, acclaimed journalist Anne Applebaum delivers a groundbreaking history of how Communism took over Eastern Europe after World War II and transformed in frightening fashion the individuals who came under its sway. Iron Curtain describes how, spurred by Stalin and his secret police, the Communist regimes of Eastern Europe were created and what daily life was like once they were complete. Drawing on newly opened East European archives, interviews, and personal accounts translated for the first time, Applebaum portrays in chilling detail the dilemmas faced by millions of individuals trying to adjust to a way of life that challenged their every belief and took away everything they had accumulated. As a result the Soviet Bloc became a lost civilization, one whose cruelty, paranoia, bizarre morality, and strange aesthetics Applebaum captures in these electrifying pages.
A Nervous Splendor, Vienna 1888-1889
A portrait of Vienna at the end of the 19th century, this book focuses on Crown Prince Rudolph, his devastating suicide and the rich texture of gossip and daily life at the Habsburg Court.
Budapest, A Cultural History
This brilliant guide introduces the history and traditions of this Central European cultural capital, with emphasis on its most important artists and architects.
The Cathedral Builders of the Middle Ages
This pocket-size encyclopedia of the art, architecture and culture of the Middle Ages features hundreds of drawings, color illustrations and a brief chronology.
The Magic Lantern, The Revolution of '89 Witnessed in Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin, and Prague
With a chapter each on Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin and Prague, this eyewitness account by an astute journalist and historian shows these vibrant cities during a time of great change.
Journey By Moonlight
One of the best-known novels in contemporary Hungarian literature tells the story of Mihály, who goes to Italy with his new wife Erzsi. When bride and groom become separated at a provincial train station, Mihály embarks on a chaotic and bizarre journey that leads him finally to Rome, where he must reckon with both his past and his future.
The Hare With Amber Eyes
Edmund de Waal unfolds the story of his remarkable family, a grand banking family, as rich and respected as the Rothschilds, who "burned like a comet" in early 20th-century Paris and Vienna.
Lonely Planet Central Europe
With dozens of maps, color photographs and sections on history and culture, this practical guide introduces Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Poland and their neighbors.
Poland: A Novel
In this sweeping novel, James A. Michener chronicles eight tumultuous centuries as three Polish families live out their destinies. The Counts Lubonski, the petty nobles Bukowksi, and the peasants Buk are at some times fiercely united, at others tragically divided. With an inspiring tradition of resistance to brutal invaders, from the barbarians to the Nazis, and a heritage of pride that burns through eras of romantic passion and courageous solidarity, their common story reaches a breathtaking culmination in the historic showdown between the ruthless Communists and rebellious farmers of the modern age. Like the heroic land that is its subject, Poland teems with vivid events, unforgettable characters, and the unfolding drama of an entire nation.
Prague in Black and Gold, Scenes from Life in a European City
Both a history and an accessible guide to the neighborhoods and architecture of the city.
Kingdom of Auschwitz
Otto Friedrich's slim book is an intensely personal account of the infamous Auschwitz death camp. He covers the entire history of Auschwitz in short chapters punctuated with eyewitness accounts and testimonies.
Danube
Mixing history, personalities and literature, Magris traces the course of the Danube from its source in the heart of the Austro-Hungarian Empire through the Balkans to the Black Sea in this anything but conventional travelogue, first published in 1986.
The Haunted Land, Facing Europe's Ghosts After Communism
In this groundbreaking book, a journalist reports on how the newly democratized people of East Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic have confronted the horrors of their former governments.
The Krakow Ghetto Pharmacy
One Polish pharmacist's eyewitness account of the history of the Krakow Ghetto. First published in 1947, Tadeusz Pankiewicz's memoir vividly depicts the horrors inflicted upon the inhabitants of the Jewish district. From his pharmacy in the heart of the ghetto, Pankiewicz watched a tragedy unfold -- a tragedy that would claim the lives of his friends and neighbours.
Budapest 1900
Written by a distinguished historian and native son, this richly detailed portrait of the city at its zenith includes hundreds of illustrations.
The Girl in the Red Coat: A Memoir
As a child in German-occupied Poland, Roma Ligocka was known for the bright strawberry-red coat she wore against a tide of gathering darkness. Fifty years later, Roma, an artist living in Germany, attended a screening of Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List, and instantly knew that “the girl in the red coat”—the only splash of color in the film—was her. Thus began a harrowing journey into the past, as Roma Ligocka sought to reclaim her life and put together the pieces of a shattered childhood.
The result is this remarkable memoir, a fifty-year chronicle of survival and its aftermath. With brutal honesty, Ligocka recollects a childhood at the heart of evil: the flashing black boots, the sudden executions, her mother weeping, her father vanished…then her own harrowing escape and the strange twists of fate that allowed her to live on into the haunted years after the war. Powerful, lyrical, and unique among Holocaust memoirs, The Girl in the Red Coat eloquently explores the power of evil to twist our lives long after we have survived it. It is a story for anyone who has ever known the darkness of an unbearable past—and searched for the courage to move forward into the light.