how many people does it take to get stefanie and emily from terezín to prague?

i posted the answer to this question on facebook and received a few confused responses, so here i am to set the record straight:

it only takes one old man on a bike, one cheerful ticket lady, and the entire terezín police force to stefanie and emily safely back to prague.

here's why:
stefanie and i spent the day in terezín. that day happened to be a saturday. we took the bus there in the morning and looked at the schedule when we arrived and decided that the last bus we could take back left before 6pm. after walking around the town and visiting all of the places that were open on saturday (most of them), we headed back to the bus stop. we arrived at 5:35ish. when we looked again at the schedule, we discovered that the bus we wanted was supposed to come at 5:35. we waited around a bit, but it didn't come.

then we saw an old man on a bike and i stopped him and using my slovak and his czech, we got him to help us out. he looked on the schedule and (i think he didn't want to have to tell us that there wasn't another bus, so he) told us that there was one at about 6:30pm. we waited around for that bus, but it never came. so, we headed into town to try to find a hotel or something so that (as a last resort) we could get a taxi and pay the huge fare to get back to prague (45 minutes by car) that night. as we were searching for a hotel, i spotted a police station!

we went into the police station and i explained our situation and asked if the man behind the glass could help us out. he turned around and got on the computer to search for some form of transportation we could take... then another guy came to help him... then another... then he explained to me that the next town over had two trains leaving for prague at 7:39 and 8:08pm (by then it was about 7pm). we had to turn left at the intersection and it was a 25-30 minute walk to the next town.

it was already dark out and stef and i had been walking around all day, so we were a bit hesitant, but what other option did we have? i wasn't so sure about just turning left and walking until we got there, so i asked if he had a map (mapy is the word i used...i'm not sure if it really translates though) or could draw us one ("as if we're here [putting my finger on a spot on the counter] and we go like this here [using my finger to trace a path to a second point on the counter]"-all in my slovak, of course). the men went into a group huddle and then one guy came out from behind the bars (stef thinks he was a fourth man, i think he was one of the original three), asked if it was just the two of us, and when i said yes, he said he would take us to the train station. so, we got to ride in a czech police car to the next town over.

when he dropped us off, he pointed to where we could get tickets, then said that prague was to the left (and pointed). i thanked him, we went in, and bought the tickets. as we waited for the train, several trains passed by, and the ticket lady would tell us each time that it wasn't our train. then, there was one that came and was going in the direction of prague. we asked, and she said yes, we needed to go through this tunnel that goes under the tracks. we ran through the tunnel and came up on the other side when the train was flying by. so we waited and then the 8:08pm train came. as it came, she called to us that this was it, we thanked her, got on, and safely made it back to prague. what an adventure it was.