Prague, Czech Republic

25 April 2002

Here’s an update from my weekend in Prague.

Prague, actually Praha in Czech, was excellent. I don't know what I was expecting but whatever expectations I had were completely blown out of the water.

We arrived around midday on Good Friday, having gotten up at 5am to make it to the airport on time. On the taxi drive in we were impressed by a huge building with spires and turrets, and wondered what it was..... a university? Government agency? No, it was a post office ;-)

So we checked into our (basic) hotel, and went exploring. There were trams all over the place, but we decided to go on foot to see what we could see. Given we were heading towards the river (the Vltava), it was all down hill anyway. So we meandered through the cobbled streets.... yes, most of the streets of inner city Prague are brick-like cobbles, until we found our way to to Old Town Square. Amazing buildings surrounded it everywhere, but two in particular stood out. The Church of St Tyn can only be described as the penultimate of fairytale castle construction. You know the fairytale castle in Disneyland? Exactly that, but with a black roof. Soaring spires, with small minarets upon larger minarets, it was just an amazing sight. Then there was a clock tower with the astronomical clock, which hourly has a little display of death (a skeleton) ringing a bell, and figures moving past windows and nodding to the crowd. We scaled the many stai! rs in the clock tower for an excellent - though windy - view out over the city, and spotted a nice restaurant a little out of the way while we were up there. The view was fantastic, with the 100s of spires plain to see.

So, on heading back down to ground level we searched out that little restaurant we saw from on high. In heading there we passed a stall selling (and making) full blown arms and armour! Swords, daggers, gauntlets, the whole 9 yards of steel. Weren't allowed to touch and play though :-( Anyway, we found the restaurant, decided it was too cold to eat outside with the wind (doh! they had a great BBQ set up), and went inside. The food was great, we had steak with bread dumplings and this awesome sauce which seemed like a really thick spicy soup, also with a slice of orange, cranberry sauce and cream. The taste sensation! So with *very* full bellies, we headed off for more adventure. There were stalls all over the place. I'm not sure whether it was just for easter weekend, or a general tourist trap... I am guessing the latter. Marionettes and crystal stalls and shops were everywhere. We didn't do a marionette show, as we were warned against it by some others, but they were cool to see hanging by the streets all the same.

What did we do after this? Hmmm... powder tower and shopping district, and back to the hotel for some warmer clothes, as the temperature was dropping quickly!
Having been recommended to, we found and walked over Charles Bridge. Since it was quite miserable when we did it, we were almost alone. Given the next night it was incredibly crowded, it was good to see without the thousands of bodies. It's basically a great paved road over the Vltava, with about 20 statues of saints along it, and bastion towers at each end. You'll see the photos soon! That night we found a little restaurant in a back street far from the main tourist trap, and had a wonderful meal... twice more than either of us would usually eat. I had a pork knuckle, which seems to equate to half a leg! Came on it's own chopping board even!

Saturday saw us rise ridiculously early to beat the crowds up to Prague Castle. We were recommended this by previous research, but given the miserable and cold morning we timed it a little TOO early. Getting up at 6am on holiday should be banned..... I have no problem STAYING up that late, but rising is not one of my favourite things. But we managed to see the changing of the guard with only 3 other tourists in sight, and got some excellent people-less photo's of the square there, so I guess that was worth it. We also managed to be almost the first ones in to the biggest site of the castle, St Vits Cathedral. It reminds me hugely of Notradam. Though of course it's Paris cousin was larger, this cathedral had excellent stained glass windows, and gargoyles as well (I hope my raining photos come out of those....water streaming from the mouth and such). After climbing yet more steps - about 600 I believe - to an even better view over the city! , but due to the low visibility caused by the rain, it was masked in rain haze. Navigating down the stairs was of course difficult, with people coming up and only a shoulders width to try and move out of the way, but on exiting we moved on to the rest of the castle. As you can tell by the description, Prague castle is separated into several sections, each with it's own entry.

The other parts were less interesting so I'll summarise. The main palace held the thrown room, a bedroom and a chapel of the king, but it's main feature was the main room, where jousts were held in the event of bad weather. I'd never even THOUGHT of people holding jousts inside, but I suppose to keep the rust off.... There was a Powder Tower, which held the alchemists and the black powder, and the Church of St George - a few statues of St George and dragons adorn the castle in general. Then there was Golden Lane, which had a bunch of tiny little stores as they might have been in medieval times, also with it's own armoury. They even had an indoor crossbow range, which of course I HAD to have a god at. Damn inaccurate crossbows! I even missed the target once (out of 5), though I got only a tiny bit short of the bullseye. Then we went on down through the castle terraced gardens and back to the hotel. After a nap (exhausted from ! 2 really early mornings) and dinner, we headed to eastern Europes biggest club, then headed home in the wee hours of the morning.

Sunday morning we decided to relax.... touristing too hard stops it from being a holiday. And with the weather becoming excellent, we sat out in the hotel courtyard and had a leisurely breakfast and coffees while getting a bit of a tan. We then headed out on an organised tour to Karlsteyn Castle, built by Charles IV, the only Holy Roman Emperor ever to have come from Czech, to house the crown jewels and other artefacts. An absolutely amazing castle, with great views over the surrounding area, truly and magnificent piece of architecture. It came of course with yet MORE steps up to it, after a fair hike up the mountain to get to it, but you get that ;-)

On getting back, we went on a short boat trip up the Vltava, though this was a little disappointing compared to our trips on the Thames and in Paris.

On Monday we had only a few hours to go with, as we had to check out of the hotel and catch the plane in the early afternoon, but we managed to go to the Jewish Cemetery, which has many layers of burials there. We also visited the various synagogues we were allowed in to, which we pretty impressive. After a whirlwind weekend like what we had however, you get a bit bored of seeing another church. So we headed on back around the old square area, then on back to the airport.

Overall impression is it’s a great city, with friendly people, and the best place in the world if you’re on the Atkins diet *grin*

So that was the weekend.

Signing off…

James

Photos to come soon...