daytrips from Brno, Czech Republic
 

Hi everyone,
I'm a first time traveler to Europe and I've decided to jump right in and spend a week in eastern europe. I'll be there during the last week of Decemeber. I've found what I believe to be a good airfare/hotel deal on Orbitz for Brno, Czech Republic so I'm looking to use Brno as "home-base" for some daytrips. I understand that Prague is 3 hours by train and Vienna is 2, so those are definitely options. Are there any other places of interest (cities, scenic areas, historical sites, etc.) that people could recommend that would make a good day trip?

My experiences, FWIW: If you do take a train from Brno to Prague/Praha, be sure to get an express train. There are locals which take forever. DH and I learned this the hard way last fall. You DO NOT want a local into Praha.

Pardubice is a possible visit from Brno. We stopped off for about an hour or so there and took a taxi to the historical square, which is, IMO, just heart-stopping beautiful. We had no time to walk around, though I was ready to unpack my bags and stay for weeks if I could. The rest of Pardubice is just a large commercial/standard type city, however, and if you do decide to see the "historische" (the one word, German word, our cab driver and we could mutually understand) area, do be warned that not all cab drivers will be willing to work with you on the language barrier. It helps to draw pictures in a notepad. We found one cooperative cab driver who worked with us, and we doubled the cab fare, we were so grateful.

Other stops in the area: A college town is supposed to be lovely, and near Brno. Olomouc (pronounced O loh moets, accent first syllable). We meant to see it but didn't.

Brno, what little we saw of it (i.e., walking around the train station environs) is a largish city marked by an atomic reactor, rather a startling sight to see from your hotel window. We stayed at the Grand Hotel, pleasant (and, ah, novel in decorating, sort of Early American meets European chandelier) to us (they were sold out of everything except one of their executive rooms). We liked it, but then, when we're in Middle Europe/ Eastern Europe, we're pretty much pleased, period.

I myself wouldn't want to try to sightsee in other towns while staying at Brno, but if the air/hotel package is really good, I'm guessing you could probably find it fun. Depends on your patience and energy level.

BTW, can I ask how good this air/hotel package is?

You can easily take a train to Kromeritz (sorry I don't remember where you change trains, but the connection is directly across the station on a "spur line" with a one car train to go the last 4-5 miles.) Easy walk to the center of Kromeritz. In the town is the Bishops Castle where much of the scenery for Amadeus was filmed.