More in Prague

I think Prague should be on your "must see" list. It is a great city and I have been thoroughly pleased and impressed with the city and her people in just the few short days I have been here!

The last two mornings I have gotten up and gone for a walk by myself. I didn't realize how much I had missed mornings. Of course, I had been my usual self and still been waking up early, but I ended up just doing things in the hotel while the others woke up and got ready. I decided that I wanted to get out and see the city. I love watching a city come to life in the morning. People walking children to school, people walking their dogs, friends enjoying a coffee together, stores opening up and artists setting up their booth on the street. There is a certain energy and feeling as a city comes to life and I have enjoyed being a part of it here in Prague the last couple of mornings. Another bonus is that there are not nearly as many people out on the street, so I can enjoy more of the sites more peacefully as well!

Our first adventure yesterday morning was St. Nicholas' Cathedral. I did a bit of research the other day and found out that St. Nicholas is actually from Turkey and was never officially canonized. I still haven't put all of the pieces together as to why there is a cathedral here named after him, I must work more on that, but I do know that it was built by the Jesuits.

First we climbed the attached bell tower and enjoyed some beautiful fews of the city and all of the rooftops. We learned more about the history of bell making and the magical power that many bells seem to posses.

The inside of the Cathedral is grand, and almost gaudy with all of the gold "trimmings." Apparently the Cathedral was built to remind people of the power of Rome and looking around, you can easily tell that! My parents made a discover recently, that is of course not a discovery to a lot of the world, but it was a discovery to our family. Apparently Mary's mother, Jesus' grandmother was named Anne. If you don't know, that is my middle name and my grandmother's name. In the Cathedral, there are several small chapels, one of them is dedicated to St. Anne, but I was disappointed that it was the one chapel that was closed for some renovation work.

Next we opted for a walking tour of Prague. Prague is a great city for walking because everything is so close and convenient. There are not many stop lights, only at major intersections. At those lights, you must wait for the "little green man" to say that you can walk, but at all other crossings all you have to do is step onto the crosswalk and people stop for you to cross!! Amazing! We had found a brochure for a walking tour and decided it looked good, so we met our guide and about 20 other people in St. Wenceslas' Square to begin our 4 hour tour.

There is so much history here, just like in other parts of Europe because this area has been inhabited for so long. She told us about wars, revolutions, changes in dynasties and ruling powers. Sadly, I don't remember enough to explain the history to you, perhaps when I get home I can do more research and have a deeper understanding of the happenings here.

She did show us where the Communist Museum is and although we did not visit it, I found it humorous when she told us that the museum was in the same building as a casino and McDonalds. "Finally, they are all together," she said!

Our tour took us around the Old Town Square, the New Town Square, the Jewish Center of town, the Charles Bridge and back up to the castle. Prague is actually made up of 4 different small towns that used to each have their own city hall, and a wall built around the city. That helps to explain why the streets are so difficult to navigate and how they don't necessarily run in block forms!

On our tour we also took a short trolley ride. We had ventured onto the metro here, but not yet the trolley and I don't think we will again! It was jam-packed when we got on the trolley and so we had to stand and hopefully find something to hold onto. I guess because the trolleys run on the road, not underground like the metro, they have to make frequent, jerky stops. No matter what, we were thrown around a lot! We made it safely to the castle though and can Czech (haha!) trolleys off of our list!

On our way to St. Nicholas yesterday morning we happened upon the restaurant, Olympia, which a local had recommended to me back in April. Surprisingly, we found it by accident, I remembered the name and we made it back there later that afternoon! It was great, pretty local and traditional food. We have all enjoyed goulash several times the last few days. It is basically beef stew with some sort of potato bread. Delicious! Last night mine also included potato pancakes, which I know sounds weird, but I don't see how you can really mess up meat and potatoes!

We had enjoyed our tour guide, Nina, earlier in the day, so we decided to meet up with her for a ghost tour of Prague last night. We met her in the Old Town Square and followed her to some quiet corners and some churches where she told us about ghosts that haunted the city. She also had her 20 year old sons in on the deal, for after she told us a story, someone dressed like the ghost would appear behind a corner. Our favorite was the one about the skeleton that walked around begging for money, and then a person dressed in a Halloween like skeleton costume came out from behind a corner with his hands out begging for money. Our guide was enjoyable, and the ghost tour ended up being more funny than scary, but no matter what, we had a good time!

We all thought that the German language was a challenge, which it is, but many of our English words are sort of similar to German words. Our at least if you can manage to pronounce the German word, it ends up sounding like the English word with some extra syllables attached. I am so thankful here that most people speak English. This language is a challenge! Nothing looks familiar! It is similar to the Russian language, but not as many different letters. Our guide told us yesterday, jokingly, that a person who speaks two languages is called bilingual, a person who speaks three trilingual and a person who speaks one is called American. It is true, whenever I travel abroad, I feel ignorant that I cannot speak a language and that they can all speak mine. I am so impressed with the people here!

The people here, much like Berlin, have been very friendly and very helpful. It helps to make this already beautiful city even more beautiful!

Thanks for reading!