Pretty In Prague

Wow. I'd heard good things about Prague being a beautiful city and all, but it surpassed my expectations. Our hotel was in the "new town" area so my first impressions were mostly of that area. It's nice and all, but nothing to go ga-ga over. But around noon on the first day we walked in to the old town square and I had found the Prague I was expecting. Climbed the clock tower for an even better view and was convinced that Prague is indeed the most beautiful city I've seen. Rome was "grander", Jerusalem more "impressive", Venice and Florence more "quaint", Innsbruck more "scenic", but for sheer aesthetics, Prague takes the cake. As I understand it, Prague was the largest city that was relatively undamaged during WWII, so most of its old buildings were still intact and not rebuilt in the last 50 years. It definitely shows.

From the Old Town square, we had lunch then crossed the famous Charles Bridge, climbed another tower there, and went on to The 2nd Church of St. Nicolaus we've seen here (I believe there's a third, but I never saw it). That was the first time I've encountered a church that charged to enter. Since they all look the same anyway by now, we didn't bother. We then headed back along the river and stopped at the hotel in New Town for a break. I had already walked poor little Ethan and Carla to exhaustion (about 8 hours on foot), so they called it a day, but I had a couple hours of daylight left so I went on to Vysehard, having no real idea what it was (other than it use to be a castle) or whether I could get in. The long hike was worth it though, it turned out to be public park, so after circling to find a way up, entrance was free and the views were worth many times what I had paid. Well worth the trip down there if you are ever here.

I also stumbled into some kind of Czech beer gardens there. They had an actual wood burning grill full of pork, chicken and Klobsa sausage, with corn on the cob to boot. Everything was in Czech but I couldn't pass up the experience and tried to order anyway. Unfortunately, I had simultaneously stumbled into the first place that didn't take Euros either. The Koruna still reigns supreme here, although many places will take the Euro. Apparently this was a locals only hang-out though, the lady there didn't seem to even understand what I was trying to pay with. I left hungry and itching for a European experience, so I hiked all the way back to the windy narrow streets of old town and had myself I nice meal of lamb and eggplant under the full moon.

Day 2 was set aside for Prague Castle, which meant another walk clear across town, and up a rather large hill. Highlights were the St. Vittus Cathedral, and a museum exhibit of "The Story of Prague Castle", complete with models of its development over the past 1100 years, 7000 year old pottery from the earliest settlers, and loads of history to read through. It's interesting how little seems to be known about Czech history. From what I can gather (you don't get to read all the museum information when you've got a hyper-active 8 year old with you), there wasn't a written Czech language until well into the crusader era when it was invented specifically to translate the Bible. So other than some scant archeological information, a few early "royals" mentioned in Roman writings, and some general statements about Slavic migrations in the 6th century and the formation of the Bohemian Kingdom, there's very little said about anything here prior to the 10th century CE. All the exhibits I've come across cover "pre-history to 918" with a pretty broad brush, then get into good ol' St. Wencelas. Even then, there's a lot of gaps and apparent guess work up until about 1500. From there the history gets pretty interesting though, including the Hussite Wars, the 30 years war (which I just saw an exhibit of one of the last battles involving the Swedes trying to fight across Charles Bridge... what the heck were they doing way down here???), and of course, WWII and the communist era. This trip is definitely re-igniting my interest in history. Of course, this is my travel blog, not Wikipedia, so I should stop digressing :)

After the Castle, the only major area of Prague I hadn't seen was Mala Strana, which is a huge forest area and highest point in Old Prague. To my surprise, Carla and Ethan decided to come with me for that part, so I marched them up and down that hill, as well as yet another tower at the top (a mini-Eifel tower from the looks of it). One of my favorite things to do in any city is to climb a tower and get a good look of the place, so Prague was a real treat for me (and there were many more we passed up even!). I've probably walked more in the last 2 days than I did in the first week (Salzburg excluded). Legs are fine, but my feet are throbbing and ready for a break, which we are about to get.

Tomorrow we start our travels to Ukraine. 6 hours on the train back to Munich, overnight near the airport, and then a late morning flight to Donetsk where Laurie and Bruno (my little sister and brother-in-law) will pick us up for a few days of visiting with them.

PS. Sorry, no pics tonight. I can't get online with my smart-phone here, so I'm using the free computer in the lobby. It has a real keyboard, hence the more verbose entry tonight. Sorry about that. I'm wordy. Will try to post some more pics when I next get a wifi connection.