Prague (6/19)
Today we made the journey (via tram) back to Old Town and the Prague Castle. The castle is actually an entire complex that dates from the 9th century and it is currently the official office of the Czech President. Which explains all the soldiers we saw.
View of St. Vitus Cathedral as we approach the entrance
This is the entrance we used, the one to the New Royal Palace. The soldier let us pass.
Water Sprite Fountain. Notice the flag to the left? I'm pretty sure that's the presidential flag and he (Milos Zeman) was in residence at the time.
St. Vitus Cathedral. Czech kings and queens were crowned here.
Side view of St. Vitus
Gargoyle detail
Close up above the side entrance
View of Prague from the castle
Basilica doorway
Front gate
Matthias Gate. It used to stand alone as an entrance to the royal palace.
We left Prague Castle by the entrance shown above and explored the area. It was a bit less crowded here but I think there were a lot of interesting places to see.
Schwarzenberg Palace. What looks like textured brick is actually plaster done by the sgraffito method. The building is an art gallery now.
Statue of Tomas Masaryk, first president of Czechoslovakia. This statue was installed in 2000 for the 150th anniversary of his birth.
Door to the sanctuary
Church converted to a hotel
We were walking uphill, away from the castle by now. My bureaucratic senses were tingling because I could see we were entering a government area. Lots of flags, official-looking plaques, and quite a few Mercedes driving by (the car of choice for central European diplomats). Steady, steady....
Czernin Palace, the largest Baroque palace in Prague. The Czech Foreign Ministry has had its offices here since the 1930s.
Cobblestones
Pohorelec Square
We took the tram back down the hill and while Fe and I were discussing where we should get off the line, a nearby passenger asked if she could help. I thought her accent odd for a local, but it turned out she was an exchange student from Virginia studying political science and history at Charles University. Should've mentioned the blog.
When we left the hotel that morning I had asked the desk clerk if she could tell me where she or her family would eat--away from the touristy areas. She marked up a city map and we went to the food court of the Novy Smichov Shopping Center. We chose--Fe did, really--a Lebanese place that was really good. The lady at the counter seemed to know everybody that came by. The mall even had a Tesco! Of course we went in to shop for candy and cookies to bring back. The day just kept getting better and better.
Unfortunately, our luck didn't hold. It was late afternoon and we had gone back to the hotel to drop everything off and it started raining really hard. It let up, but I could smell the pollen in the air and Fe's allergies acted up. I looked around for some allergy medicine, but you have to go to a pharmacy to get it and they were all closed by that time. No late-night CVS or Rite-Aid here! I even tried a grocery store but I don't think they're allowed to sell over-the-counter medicines like in the US--at least I couldn't find anything. It had started raining again so we wouldn't have been able to see much that night anyway.
Prague (6/20)
This morning was another trip out of central Prague to a place called Vysehrad Castle. It's actually a fortress established in the 10th Century. This place was really quiet compared to the bustle of Prague Castle yesterday--I'm glad we saw it.
Leopold's Gate, entrance to the castle
Rotunda of St. Martin, built in the second half of the 11th Century
Front of the basilica
Basilica altar
Ceiling detail
Stained glass window
Vysehrad cemetery. Many Czech notables are buried here: scientists, poets, clergy
Shrine within the cemetery arcade
View through the castle wall
Fe is breaching the fortifications
View from the wall. You can see some of the ruins in the foreground.
View from the castle wall
There was a cafe in the castle park area and (naturally) we stopped for a coffee and a snack. I chose to call it brunch.
Our next stop was the Prague (or Zizkov) TV Tower. To get there, we took the subway and walked through a nice little neighborhood with a street market. We saw a different-looking church along the way.
The Church of the Most Sacred Heart of Our Lord. This church was built in the 1930s, designed by Slovenian architect Joze Plecnik.
TV tower. The tower was built between 1985 and 1992.
The babies on the tower were an art installation in 2000 by David Cerny. It was meant to be temporary, but the "tower babies" were so well-liked that they were returned permanently in 2001.
This took up most of the day, though I did manage to get some pictures of buildings around town. With the exception of the synagogue, I don't know what they were. You may have to zoom in to see some of the detail I was going for.
We are leaving tomorrow (6/21) on a 9:25 am flight, so we'll be getting up pretty early. Now to make sure everything is packed for our return.
Prague (6/21)
We dragged our luggage down to the lobby this morning and got a cab to the Prague Airport. We are flying Norwegian Air back, with a 5+ hour layover in Stockholm. I know that I said we might take a tour of Sweden's capital while we wait, but I think we are changing our mind on that. We're both pretty tired.
We've flown this airline before on out trip to Spain in 2017. I was pleased then and had no complaints this time. We did leave an hour late due to a "technical problem" and the associated "paperwork", but after that everything went smoothly. Except I cannot sleep well on a plane.
No problems at JFK with immigration, all of our luggage was on the carousel, and our Holiday Inn shuttle was right on time. Finally got in bed about 1130 pm and wasn't awake for long.
USA (6/22)
Left NYC about 8 or 830 and with a traditional stop at Starlight Diner in Allentown (off I-78 on PA 100 South), we made it home about 1 pm.
Final Thoughts (6/24)
If you're still with me and have read my other blogs, you know that I have to have a final commentary. This trip lends itself to a (very non-scientific) ranking list of the cities we were in. So here it is, highest to lowest.
1. Budapest, Hungary - This was an easy one. Beautiful buildings, tons of history, great public transit that made it easy for us, and good food combined to make this capital the highlight of the trip.
2. Vienna, Austria - Culture everywhere I looked. I got the feeling that even though Austria is a small country now, it is very proud of its past and Vienna shows it. So much to see--I know we missed some things. Too bad there was all that scaffolding and construction around.
3. Bratislava, Slovakia - This (to me) is a very close call--I almost made it #2. A capital city with a small-town feel, the people here were very friendly and it was also the cheapest of all four cities. There were tourists here of course, but it was easy to get around them. And if you went sightseeing early enough, it was almost like you had these things to yourself.
4. Prague, Czech Republic - Yes, Prague came in last and before we left I thought it would be the high point. Don't get me wrong--the city was beautiful and we saw so much that we'd never see anywhere else--I highly recommend it. But this was the most crowded place we visited and it was the only place that had huge dancing panda bears in the town square. Maybe we were tired by this point and it affected my outlook.
The other thing that makes the above list unscientific (IMHO) is that you can't get a good feel for a country just by visiting the capital. Could you judge the US by only visiting Washington, DC? Anyway, I'd like to come back to any of these countries in the future, use the capital as a base, and hen take trains to the cities hardly anyone has heard about. That way, you're doing more than touring a country--you're experiencing it.
