Time out for a new culture Czech

AS we drove east from Munich after a comfortable flight from Cork with our national airline and its ever courteous staff, we crossed a range of heavily-wooded hills relieved by golden meadows: the gold being dandelions packed as tightly as pixels in a photograph.

I have never seen 10-acre fields of dandelions before. Were they a commercial crop? There was nobody to ask. On our approach to Munich we had seen huge fields of lemon-yellow oilseed rape below us, the farmlands of lowland Bavaria laid out in perfect geometry.

Beyond the mountains, in the Czech Republic, the landscape was less organised. Marsh marigolds bloomed in gay profusion along every water course and – a healthy sign – the windscreen of the rented car was soon splattered with the bodies of all manner of flies.