Note: this was typed on a smartphone. Proofing etc etc not worth the effort.
Around mid day, we hopped on a train to Cologne, Germany. After a 5 hour layover, we boarded a sleeper train headed to Prague. We reserved "couchettes" which are 2nd class sleeping accommodations. It was a 6 person berth, with three bunked planks on either side. Clare and i had the middle bunks and our only berth mate, a lady who never spoke, had the accommodation above me. The trainline provided a sheet, blanket, and pillow. It was surprisingly comfortable, and we slept pretty well. In the morning we laid in bed and watched the Czech country side out the window. Gorgeous.
We arrived at the main station in Prague, and navigated our way to our abode via metro and tram. After an (optimistic) navigational error took us down the hill in the wrong direction to our apartment, we corrected and climbed with our luggage the 5 blocks up the hill and were there.
We rented a place about 20 minutes outside of the city center on Airbnb. Five nights only cost us 200 bucks. Not only a great value (the place was really nice, spacious and clean - and half the price of the Amsterdam apartment), but also refreshing to be anchored outside of the tourist bubble. The city center was suprisingly busy. Not Amsterdam busy, annoying tourist busy. I don't know if it's like that year round, or just in the summer and for Christmas in the winter.
We were hoping for a white Christmas when we decided on Prague a month ago, but it was more like mid September. Sunny, mid 50s everyday. Spectacular weather. Wish I had brought some shorts.
Prague was only the third European city I've visited, so it was hard not to compare with the other two (not counting Cologne, which was also annoyingly busy, at least what we saw. And expensive. Not planning a return trip). For our honeymoon in August 2014, we visited Hungary, staying a week in Budapest and a week in the countryside. In the city, we visited some attractions, and 'took the waters.' We took the waters on multiple occasions, as it were. Beautiful, old, ornate Turkish baths. In the countryside, we rode bicycles to wineries and ate in charming hillside cafés. Can you say goose liver pate? It was fantastic. We then spent a quick couple of nights in Amsterdam, motivating our return this year, rounding out the 3 cities.
Prague and Budapest are pretty similar in ways; they are both on large rivers and they both have large castle complexes on the hillside. I'd return to Budapest in a heartbeat, and likely won't visit Prague again.
The blogosphere asserts that "everything worth seeing in Prague can be accomplished in a day and a half." I don't know where these people live, but I pity them because they have likely long exhausted "everything worth seeing" there. But, alas, it's probably the amenities, activities, restaurants, community, friends and family those towns offer that keep their interests piqued. Things that can also be experienced while traveling.
Clare and I have been traveling together a long time (look back through the archives of this blog to hear about it), and figured out immediately that we seek the same types of experiences. We shoot from the hip, don't like itineraries, seek good local food, like to be active and engage with whatever the unique thing of the place might be. If we find something we enjoy, we do it, and then move on when we are done. Sometimes we miss a few "must sees", but we are usually satisfied. It's your vacation, your money, and your time. Do what you want.
Prague is a beautiful historic city bisected by the Vltava river. The city center only seems to function as a tourist attraction. And draw the tourists it does. All the restaurants, all the shops, everything, are like a garden of Venus fly traps, gobbling up the buzzing tourists. The historic sites, like sweet flowers, are scattered about.
We paced ourselves on this leg. After a pretty busy week in Amsterdam, we looked forward to recouping. We are in a marathon here, Clare is getting bigger by the day. Supposedly gaining a pound per week at this stage.
The first day we spent the afternoon lounging on the couch, reading, writing, and enjoying our new space. We ventured out for dinner and found a great place in our neighborhood. In case you haven't heard, the Czech folks like beer. It's served in giant half liter mugs with a thick frothy head. And it's cheap, about 30 krown. I drank at least two of these with every lunch and dinner.
The following day was Christmas Eve. We went to the historic Old Town Square,the site of one of many Christmas markets. We arrived before noon, so it was comfortably bustling, but not crowded. I drank hot spiced red wine, ate a giant kolbasa (pro tip: the extra long sausage is put in the bun 'upside down' so the ends are curved down rather than up, then they smack the middle of the sausage with their tongs to make the thing lie flat in the bun), fresh potatoe chips and Clare enjoyed a trdelnik, a traditional pastry treat. Dough is wrapped around a wide dowel and cooked over an open fire, then rolled in sugar and nuts. Yum.
The crafts and crap for sale at the market really weren't very interesting, so we didn't buy anything.
We had known that Prague kind of shuts down for the holidays, so we were a little anxious about where we would eat dinner outside of an over priced tourist trap. We decided to search for a place near our apartment.
(All restaurants in Czech Republic are sponsored by one of the large breweries and thus display that breweries sign out front. The better restaurants are sponsored by Pilsner Urquell, the largest brewery. See beer sign, find restaurant. This is discussed in greater detail on a fantastic blog maintained by a Canadian expat, www.pragueczechtravel.com)
We encountered mostly shuttered places, but stumbled upon a little mom and pop hotel with the tell tale Pilsner sign out front. The restaurant was serving a fixed menu of traditional grub. We walked in and they sat us right away. It was 4 courses, a quinoa salad casserole thing, fish soup, fried cod with potatoe salad and an apple strudel ala mode for dessert. It was a great, cosy, experience. The food, meh.
On Christmas day, we visited the Markets in Wencelas Square, hoping for something different. Well, turns out, all the Christmas markets are the same, selling the exact same food and exact same trinkets. Oh well. We had some more street fare and wandered around town. That night there was a couple restaurants in our neighborhood open, so we had dinner in a smoky bar, before the big Christmas concert!
We got front row balcony seats at Dvorak Hall in the Rudolfinum. It was a fantastic concert. So good, in fact, that I fell asleep during the first act. It was so cosy! (Not to mention the liter of beer i had with dinner, the Jager shot as we passed through a Market by the metro, another half liter at the bar around the corner from the venue and the glass of champagne inside the venue.)
The following day we walked up to the castle complex and looked around, it was very castley. There were so many people that we opted not to wait in line to go in. We then walked back down the hill and across the famed St Charles bridge. There were a million people. It was hard to appreciate, but apparently it's always like that. We then walked along the river for a few miles to the old forgotten castle and oldest building in Prague. It was nice and there were significantly less people around to get in my way and annoy me.
That night we had another mediocre meal with copious amounts of beer. So much meat and potatoes!
The next day was our last full day, so we got up early to tackle our chores. We needed to mail a package back to the USA and buy train tickets to get out of town. We went to the main post office, and when our number was called, we proceeded to play charades with the teller. I think it was successful. We got a box, wrote our address on it, she lent us tape! and wet paid. We'll see. We then bought train tickets to Slovenia for the next morning. After so much productivity, we grabbed lunch at a highly regarded Vietnamese place, Remember. We got some vegetables and were happy. We found a good restaurant blog to guide our last couple meals now that things were opening back up.
We spent the afternoon touring the old jewish synagogues and cemetery. The cemetery was unlike anything i have seen before. Bodies buried 12 deep and tombstones haphazardly crammed everywhere they could fit. No orderly rows here, folks. It was intense.
For our last dinner, we ate at Ukurelu, an up scale ish bar/restaurant. It was decent. The food and drink in Prague were very inexpensive, so it was a nice change of pace from Amsterdam.
Overall we had a nice time. It was relatively inexpensive and offered a nice opportunity to take it easy. We spread out the day and a half of stuff 'worth seeing' over the week and it was a great pace. I couldn't imagine cramming all that in so quickly. The number of tourists really detracts from the experience, so spreading it out was nice. We were hoping for cooler weather and more of a Christmas atmosphere that would result. Drinking hot wine in 50 degrees and sunny just didn't quite live up to its potential.
The next morning we caught a 7 o'clock train to Vienna in route to Slovenia.
Peace, y'all, and happy new year.
