22_Travelling

22) Travelling

Travelling has become an inseparable part of our world and its very important for our lives. Travelling takes up more time than most of us imagine. People travel in order to reach places that are close or far away, they travel for fun or from necessity. An everyday form of travelling may be going shopping, commuting to school, to work or visiting friends.

For travelling, we need some means of transport. Generally, we can divide them into two groups - the public transport and the other means.

The public transport is for example the bus, tram, trolley or the underground.

The buses are mostly used for the everyday commuting to work or school. Almost every town has its own system of bus transport. This means is not so expensive and it’s relatively fast. We often use the bus for the short distances, but sometimes also for the international transport. In this case, travelling by bus is not so fast and comfortable. However, it’s cheaper than for example travelling by plane.

In some bigger cities we can find trams or trolleys which are silent, not polluting and quite fast for the travelling round the city. In the CR there are trams for example in Prague or Brno and trolleys in Pilsen.

We also have the underground in the capital city since 1974 with 3 lines and 57 stations. The underground is also in lots of foreign cities for example in London it‘s called „the Tube“ and it’s the oldest one in the world. Today, there are 11 lines and almost 300 stations. The advantages of the underground are the speed of the transport in the city, comfort and price (it’s not so expensive).

On the other hand the public means of transport have also some disadvantages. For example they are often crowded especially in the morning and afternoon rush hours and you can also meet a pickpocket there.

The trains are also often used as the means of transport. They can be faster than the buses and they are also more comfortable with more space. On the other hand, trains in the CR are often late and dirty. But they are still used by a lot of people every day. These days, the express trains, for example TGV, connect the great European metropolises and allow people travel the long distances fastly and comfortably.

The other means are for example car, bike, motorbike and also means that are not used very often, like plane or ship. These two last means are used mainly for travelling for long and intercontinental distances, for example for journey on vacation.

Advantage of planes is that it’s the fastest and the most comfortable way to get to faraway places on the Earth. Some of the disadvanteges might be that travelling by plane is often very expensive, you have to arrive to airport quite early to pass all the controls and catch your plane and some people are also scared of flying.

Ship was used for transport mostly in the past. Nowadays it’s used more just for the trips or business.

Bike is known in our country usually as the way for going on a trip in the country etc., but in the European metropolises, it’s becoming very favourite. It’s modern and also ecological, even though it’s not very fast. It also supports your health lifestyle.