Citytrips
Brno is geographically ideal situated to visit several big cities. Bratislava, Prague, Plzen, Vienna and Budapest are relatively close to the city. The first city to which I paid a visit is Olomouc. It is an old city which you can reach in one hour and a half from Brno. I visited the city for one day together with a group of Erasmus people. One person of this group bought a train ticket in advance because of the special discount you'll get. He got only one ticket for the whole group for the way to Olomouc and back to Brno. So it was not a good idea to lose that valuable ticket.
My experience with public transport in Czech Republic is quite good and everything at the train station was denoted clearly. The train which drove us from Brno to Olomouc was very different than the normal Dutch NS-trains which I'm used to. The train consisted out of cabins where about eight people fit in: you can compare it with a 'Harry-Potter' train. The back of the train had two back doors with small windows. When you looked through them you could see the track emerging.
When we arrived in Olomouc we walked to the old city centre. We watched the astronomic clock when it was striking 12 o'clock. Afterwards we went to a restaurant to have lunch. When we had found new energy again we started walking around in the city centre and visited the botanic garden and several churches. We ended the day in an Irish pub and took the train back to Brno.
Another city which I've visited by train is Bratislava. It only takes you one hour and a half to get there. Again, I spend there a wonderful day by walking around in the old city centre and visiting the castle. From the castle you had a great view over the city. In the old city centre some buildings are more maintained than others and I liked the atmosphere. When we had some coffee in a restaurant the waitress treated us very different than a waitress in the Netherlands would do. She seemed quite rude and uninterested. We were already warned for this kind of behaviour and this type of hospitality is quite common in Slovakia. At the end of the day we had dinner, took the train and arrived safely in Brno.