Prague, Day Three

My third day in Prague was spent in the Prague Castle complex and in bed.

The throat-tickle that had started yesterday - to take a phrase from the Austrian ballad "Edelweiss" - "...began to bloom and grow..." into a full-fledged, runny-nosed and fevered bad cold. I felt not so good waking up this morning (9/28), but felt steadily worse as the day went on. That being said, I wasn't going to waste a full day in Prague, so I headed for the castle.

It was a long, uphill march to the castle. I could have taken public transportation most of the way, but you miss so much by doing so. I didn't set foot on a single mass transit vehicle in Prague my entire stay. According to my TripAdvisor App, the walk was about 1.7 miles - each way, and that doesn't count all of the walking within the huge castle complex.

Here I'm approaching the rear entrance to the castle. My strategy was this - most tourists would enter through the main gates and work to the rear - I pulled a "reverse commute" and avoided some crowds by being off-time arriving at the various points of interest. 

At the entrance were some very good classical music street performers, and, of course, the elite guard for the symbol of Prague:

 

The gates have some cool statuary:

I entered the castle and found the ticket booth. You could buy tickets of a single part of the castle, or for full access - what do you think I opted for??

You enter the grounds and you're first met with the gi-normous church which dominates the skyline of the castle complex. But, if you look closely, there are wonders within its facade:

 

The gargoyles were spectacular. And many of the buildings I will showcase for you are original - Prague was spared from bombing during WWII. 

 

 

The insides of the castle buildings were pretty neat, too:

 

 

And now, what a certain nephew of mine has been waiting for

the dungeon!

The stairway to the dungeon was guarded by a giant crossbow on wheels. I used to know the name of this weapon, but it just won't come to me - I think it starts with a "b."

The pathway to the dark, creepy dungeon was lined with suits of armor, shields, pikes and swords - medieval weapons of all kinds. 

Then, as everything was getting darker, and colder and gloomier - aha! - I had arrived at the dungeon at last!

I was fortunate to find the stairway out of the dungeon before the guards found me and shackled me to a wall!

Once out of the dungeon, I found myself along the castle wall, abutting which are tiny little houses owned by private citizens until the Goverment "bought them out." now the insides are set up with different themes from different time periods during the castle's existence.

From Golden Lane, as it is called, I made my way to the front entrance of the castle and climbed down dozens and dozens of steps. 

From the castle I headed back to the hotel. I had arrived at the castle at about 9 AM and I departed from the castle at about 4:30 PM.  During that time I was feeling progressively more ill - chills, a fever, runny nose and so forth. I walked all the way back to the hotel, crossing Charles Bridge again, and was under the covers by about 5:30 PM. I slept fitfully until the next morning and my train trip to Vienna, to be covered in my next post!

For now, some parting shots of my time in Prague!

Prague, Day Two

I woke up this morning with a tickle in my throat, but I didn't let that dissuade me from my Czech adventure.

I began my day's tour in Wencheslas Square, more of a double-sided boulevard like Les Champs-Élyses in Paris. Here you see the backside of the horse on which the brave knight, St. Wencheslas, is riding. You see, in Prague, if the locals want to meet each other, they often suggest meeting at the tail - and that's exactly where my TripAdvisor self-guided tour on my iPhone began. 

It started to rain pretty hard after I took that picture of the horse's arse, but I carried on like a trooper, just for you - my loyal readers. 

I followed the tour to the Opera House, and its brilliant embellishments.  From there I came upon the Jewish Quarter, and the new old synagogue, from about 1200 AD.

Appropriately there is a King Solomon Truck out front. I also saw a little bit of the Knights Templar, in the form of a picture of Grand Master Jacques DeMolay adorning a restaurant sign. 

From there I made my way to the center of town, the square, and beheld the oldest astronomical clock still functioning:

Don't ask me what it says, though I think we've just left Virgo and we're into Libra. Cuba Libras anyone?

From there I ascended the clock tower for a bird's eye view of the city of Prague for a nominal fee:

  

From the old town square I meandered through the historical area following the self-guided tour. 

Here I found myself outside the Kafka Museum.  Take a close look at these dueling figures (click on the photo if you're viewing the blog on my website to get an enlarged picture.) The statues are composed of horizontal slices, like the men went through a bread slicer. It's a moving statue, literally - the hips of each man swivel and the, err, "water spouts" move up and down to adjust the spray. 

I didn't tour the Kakfa museum - I was plagued by ennui. 

Moving along, I was making my way closer to the Charles Bridge, a centuries-old span connecting what are now the Old Town and the New Town. My tour had started in the New Town and I crossed a different bridge to get over to the Old Town - now time to head back, but this time over this enormous pedestrian bridge with hawkers, beggars, vendors, musicians, tourists and beautiful statuary:

 

LEFT: one end of the Charles Bridge.  RIGHT: midway along the bridge

 

LEFT: Statues of long-dead important people.  RIGHT: the other end of the bridge. 

My self-guided tour was pretty neat and it gave me a good overview of the city, at my own pace and without having to follow along with a tour group, which can sometimes be tedious. The app and the content are both free from TripAdvisor. I plan on using a similar tour in Vienna as an introduction to the city. 

A view along the river with the Charles Bridge on the right and the Prague Castle complex above on the left. I plan on spending the entire day tomorrow at the castle - and yes, Andrew, this one has a dungeon!

A bad picture of me with a decent distant view of the Prague Castle. 

Legerova 62, 120 00 Praha 2, Prague, Czech Republic.

En Route to Prague

I left Munich this morning (9/26) at 9:19 AM by high-speed ICE train, which topped out at about 215 km/h per the display at the front of my coach. I don't know what that is in American, but I'd say pretty fast. I arrived at the Nürnburg Hbf at 10:31 and my bus to Prague was scheduled to leave at 10:41 - another tight connection, but according to travel forums I had visited prior to leaving, the Prague bus literally parks right in front of the main station exit and the 10 minutes is plenty.  The travel advice forums were right and I found the double-decker luxury coach operated by Deutsches Bahn without difficulty and with 5 minutes to spare.

My reserved seat was on the top level, on the driver's side, in the middle of the bus. Light refreshments and snacks are served on the bus for a fairly steep price, but on advice from one of the Canadians I met on the bicycle tour way back in Salzburg, I filled my messenger bag with a Subway turkey sandwich from the Munich Hbf, and three Paulaner "big boys - pounders - half-liter" beers. Total cost for my snacks - €7. A similar smorgasbord bought on the bus would have cost me about €24.

 

Travel time to Prague from Nürnburg, about 3 hours 40 minutes. Add the 90 minutes between Munich and Nurenburg and you have a substantial travel day. 

I arrived at the Hotel Alton after walking from the main train station (that's where the bus drops you off) at about 3:30, after getting lost and changing money - The Czech Republic is in the European Union, but it has not yet adopted (or, more properly, has not yet been allowed to adopt) the Euro. Instead I now have Czech crowns, at about 20 crowns to $US 1. In other words, when I took out 5,000 crowns from the ATM, it figured out to be a little over $250.00.  It's weird to have a legal tender note in your pocket that says 2,000 on it. 

 

I used my TripAdvisor City Guides app on my iPhone to finally track down my hotel. It has a very neat "point me there" function which uses the phone's GPS and compass features to give you bearings and distance and direction, all without using a data connection. Prague is the first city I've been to so far that has been included to date in the City Guides (Vienna's in it, too!) and I'm loving the free app more and more. 

I settled into my hotel, with which I'm very pleased in terms of quality and location, and then I simply did a circuit of all of the streets surrounding the hotel to get the lay of the land. Interestingly, unlike in Germany and Austria, there are 24-hour minimarts here in Prague. I bought a Pilsner Urquell, a Czech beer, and some light snacks for the mini-fridge in my hotel room. 

I didn't do too much of anything else, except for some hand washing, as I was out of clean underwear and socks. Woolite packets this time, and I prefer the Woolite to the Tide travel packs I used last time. 

Tomorrow I plan on a self-guided walking tour of Prague's old town, courtesy again of the TripAdvisor city guide. 

Legerova 62 Praha 2, Prague 120 00, Czech Republic