So Long Prague

On Saturday morning we walked south and ventured into New Prague to climb UP to Vysehrad. 

Vysehrad is a large park surrounded by a brick wall. On the grounds is the Church of SS Peter and Paul and a large cemetery. As you walk around the grounds you are able to see the city from every angle. I was most excited to see Old Prague and all the bridges. The view wasn't exactly what I dreamed, but you can see the castle! 

Lots of people were running and walking their dogs here. It was definitely off the beaten tourist path and was kind of nice to do something without hordes of people around. 

After taking in all the views on top of Vysehrad, we went back down the hill and walked along the river back to Old Prague. Along the river there was a wonderful farmers market. Most of the shoppers were locals. They carried their fresh goods in simple, but large wicker baskets. I loved it. We stopped and bought some hot apple cider. It was warm, sweet and tasted like fall. It made our walk perfect on the chilly morning. 

There were more swans along this part of the river too. I didn't mind. Notice the ledge. They couldn't get out of the water and attack me! 

Once we made it back to Old Prague we crossed the river and set out to find John Lennon's wall. We spent a long time reading all the quotes, taking lots of pictures and just enjoying the wall. "Imagine" has been stuck in my head since. 

Right around the corner from the wall is the bridge with all the locks. People who are in love come to bridge and attach their lock and throw away the key into the river. 

 I was kind of disappointed because most of the locks were from this year. I was hoping to see some really old ones. I am not sure, but I think because so many people participate they have to cut them off from time to time. 

Our final day in Prague was my favorite. We weren't in a hurry. We saw the sun and blue skies. We warmed up by drinking hot chocolate and cider. We spent every last Czech Crown we had to buy 1 more piece of delicious cinnamon bread.  I completely enjoyed the fall day in a beautiful city with a great friend. 

Prague Day 2

Day 2 we were determined to have a more productive day of site seeing. We got up pretty early and went to Old Town Square to take some pictures during the day. 

 From there we went to the Jewish Quarter. We took a few pictures, but didn’t go on any tours.

After that, we crossed the river and started making our way up the hill to the Prague Castle. At the top of the very long staircase was an amazing view of Prague. After taking a ridiculous number of pictures we continued on into the castle grounds.

We happened to arrive right on the hour so we were able to see the changing of the guard. We knew we wanted to go on a tour of the Castel so we got in the LONG line and waited to buy our tickets. 

The Castle grounds were pretty cool. My favorite part was the cathedral. If you ever visit Prague I would recommend going to the castle, but don’t bother with the tour. You can still go into the Cathedral without a ticket and the rest of buildings weren’t too exciting.

 After seeing the crown jewels at the castle we left and took a few pictures of the Schwarzenbersky Palace. 

 By then we were starving so we stopped and had pizza at a little restaurant near the Palace and the Castle.

  

  

Then we went to the Franz Kafka Museum. He was a famous German Author who was born in Prague. His style of writing is difficult to translate into English and I hope that is why I hadn't heard of him before.  As we continued home we crossed the river and that’s when we saw all the swans. 

First Day in Prague

We took the midnight train from Catovica Doviz to Prague. We arrived just before 8 am and were ready for a full day of sight seeing. Well almost. Sleeping on the train didn't go quite as well as we hoped, so we spent a good portion of our day wandering the streets aimlessly, but still enjoyed the beauty of the city or at least the 5 to 10 buildings we walked by 100 times.  

We spent at least an hour looking for this building. Later we realized it was just 3 blocks from our hostel. 

We stumbled upon a market with lots of great Czech food. The sugary bread was my favorite! It was kind of like a mini doughnut without all the grease. We also reluctantly tried hot wine and much to our surprise, both Genna and I liked it! 

 We crossed the river and did more wandering. We were amazed by how beautiful everything was. We didn't walk more than 5 feet without snapping another picture. 

It was cold and rainy on Thursday so we stopped and got some hot chocolate. It felt so good to be warm for a few minutes. 

 For dinner we went to a Czech restaurant called Mama Lucy's. We ordered the "best" Czech beer and both agreed that it was OK. Our food was great and once again we enjoyed being inside and warm! 

Swans

Running though Prauge is the Vltava River. With the river comes lots of bridges. Although I expected them, they were still very cool! Something I didn't expect to be a part of the river was a large population of Swans. 

We saw them many times along the river and not just one or two, but huge groups of 50 or more! At first I thought it was really cool. Amazing even. They were so pretty and graceful in the water. 

We took tons of pictures.  I was already imagining my new cover photo on Facebook. Then I decided to try feeding them. My views quickly changed! 

I found out I hate swans. Hate might be too strong. Actually, I am terrified of them! They are big and mean and will nearly bite your hand off for a cracker. 

They are also mean to each other. They bite the other swans' necks and pull each other under the water. 

And you know those cool pictures where you see swans flapping their wings, well they are actually mad in those pictures and kind of scary to be around in real life. 

So I learned swans, not really my thing. 

But when they are far away and can't come bite you, they are beautiful. 

European Smile

While site seeing, we have noticed that a lot of European women don't show their teeth in pictures. Genna and I have been working on mastering this skill. Here are a few of our best attempts.

What do you think? Should we keep working on it or just show our pearly whites? 

This past weekend we had our first long weekend and took a trip to Prauge. I was already behind on posting, but now have tons to share. Ahh! 

I will try really hard to post every day this week!