Prague, the city of 100 or 1000 spires

I do not know even where to start with my trip to Prague. It was such a whirlwind!! I am going to place a lot of photos on this entry because I was so impressed by the architecture of this magical city. Okay, the one downer was the fact that it was tourist heaven. At one point, I was fighting my way through the crowds on Prague’s most famous bridge, the Charles Bridge, and I told myself, “This is enough. Get me out of here.” But on the side streets, one can discover the real Prague, and even better when one ventures into a great, large park and gets lost alongside the river; then, you really see the real Prague- from personal experience; details to follow.
I went to Prague to visit a friend who was visiting her boyfriend who now works in Prague, so I was blessed with their company and a great place to stay. The apartment was about 30 minutes walking distance from the center of town, which was a nice distance in my opinion for walking and having some time to prepare yourself for all that one could see. I am going to list all the things that I saw; then I will describe some of my adventures, as it was an adventure. This marks the 15th country I have visited; my goal is 17 by the end of this trip J Okay, I started with a Kelsey-directed and guided walking tour of Prague, the National Museum (hilarious story to follow), the Brenlov Monastery (gorgeous and worth every moment I spent there), the Municipal House (full of history and beauty), Petrin Hill and the curious Observation Tower that resembles the Eiffel Tower, St. Vitrus Cathedral and the Prague Castle (another interesting tourist story), the Charles Bridge, the Jewish Quarter, Old Town Square, a small classical concert in the Church of St. Nicholas, Faust in the Black Light Theater (truly Prague-esque and bizarre), the Dancing House and a walk alongside the Vlata River, Stromovka Park, and the Mucha Museum. Not too bad for three full days; so you can see that I was a serious tourist. I think I probably walked about 25 miles in those three days, which is probably not a surprise either!
So, the stories, the joys, the pains, the drama! No, okay, it wasn’t that exciting. I was just a normal (well, please, not normal) tourist exploring a truly incredible city. I will start with some general observations. The city is very different from the French cities to which I have become accustomed. First, there are not bakeries on every single corner, and in fact, in the three and a half days that I was in Prague, I only went to two J Pretty different than in France where bakeries are more common than Starbucks in Chicago! Anyway, the food was quite interesting; but I did not really try much of it. I went out to two restaurants, one where I ordered a warm apple cake, like apple strudel in Germany, and potato pancakes which were very tiny and completely deep-fried an delicious (although I missed the applesauce and sour cream) and the other where I ordered potato dumplings. You might have noticed that they eat a lot of potatoes, which is true, but they really eat a lot of meat, so I had to be careful what exactly I was eating. We did stop at this little stand that was making these hot rolled bread things, which were absolutely delicious but a little expensive, if you ask me. One of the best experiences was going into a real bakery, where there were only Czech people and trying to order (in French, by the way, I kept slipping and used French instead of English which is more accepted and widely spoken in Prague) by simply pointing to what I wanted. I literally spent 10 minutes in front of the cases trying to decide what I wanted; it all looked so good.
Everywhere one walks, you see wonderful architecture, frequently accompanied by the famous spires for which Prague is well-known. There are many churches in Prague, but very few people actually go to church, it seemed to me. The churches were very empty in general and mostly for the tourists. There are many great squares, some more touristy than others, but in general, the squares that I saw were encased with lovely buildings and café/restaurants. You can tell that Prague is a tourist town because one in two stores is a store for Czech crafts and thingamabobbers. However, if you want to make sure that you are really getting Czech made products, there are two stores to which you can go, called Manufaktura and Blue. These two stores guarantee that all is made in the Czech Republic. I got a kick out of all the stores just selling meaningless junk, but so it goes in the tourist centers. I even met some French while traveling, so I was able to use my two languages while in Prague.
Now for some stories…let’s start with the National Museum. With a name like the National Museum, I thought that I would see a lot about the history of the Czech Republic plus artifacts and general other historical items, maybe some crown jewels, maybe some old books, I don’t know, but things unique to the Czech Republic. What I found was a natural history museum and not really even one geared towards just the Czech Republic. It has rocks from all over the world stuck behind panes of glass…I mean talk about stick-a-needle-in-my-eye-this-is-so-boring type of exhibit. But, it got even better. I saw more stuffed animals than I ever had wished to see (which when using that scale, I have never been interested in taxidermy, meaning I saw about 200 – out of 200 – too many). The greatest part was the giant fake woolly mammoth right in the middle of one of the exhibits, then seeing a poster that said, “We have created a mammoth,” in all the glory of a Frankenstein-esque tone. Loved it! Okay, I have to give the building credit. It is a lovely building, but apart from that, I am going to have to say that my museum experience was a bust.
Another bust, and a little annoying, but whatever, was the Prague Castle. I paid $10 to see bad art, the smallest houses in Prague that had been turned into the “Golden Lane” or little shops for tourists, and the opportunity to view an array of Bohemian clocks (which now I am regretting that I did not take that chance…just kidding), but you know, tourists sometimes have to go through those moments to realize the ridiculousness of wanting to experience every lick of history or famous sights in a city. I do think I will always remember the “Golden Lane;” with a name like that and a grand disappointment behind it, how could you not always remember.
Now, to the more interesting aspects of Prague because there were definitely more good and interesting moments than there were boring and bizarre moments. I have four particular moments that stand out in my mind: going to the Brenlov Monastery and getting lost, climbing Petrin Hill, and the Mucha Museum. Brenlov Monastery was wonderful; I think the reason it touched me so much was the simultaneity of its simplicity and its serenity. To get there, I took number 22 on the tram, which is known as the most beautiful line because it goes alongside the river and through the most well-known parts of the city. Prague has an amazing system of transport; probably the best that I have ever seen. It is comprised of a tram grid, a bus grid, and three metro lines. The part of the monastery that is open to visitors is only the large church that has a grand interior and is completely white, making it seem even larger and pristine. Although the church was lovely, that is not where I sensed the spirit of God; it was in the large grounds around the church where I communed with my heavenly father and appreciated the beauty of a cloudless sky and the vibrancy of green leaves and grass. After taking my fill of the grounds and eating some delicious potato pancakes and an apple I grabbed from one of the trees, I hopped on another tram and went to the Stromovka Park. The park was something I read about just briefly on a Prague website, which informed potential visitors that it was a wonderful place to go to get away from the city. Profiting from the gorgeous fall day, I spent a couple hours walking the paths that led all around the park. I was doing great in the park, on time with the schedule I had put myself and not at all in a hurry, but it was when I wanted to exit that I encountered some problems.
If you have been following my entries or even read one account of my adventures thus far, you know that I have no sense of direction. However, I think that this experience topped them all (I know, I did not think that was possible either…to get even worse!) I had completely turned myself around and what is worse I had no idea that I was other than the area of Prague I had pictured in my mind, meaning that in my mind I was in the touristy part of Prague, but all around me, one could see that I was not remotely close to the downtown center. Had I thought a little about it and maybe looked at a map before leaving, none of this would have happened. It started by hopping a fence and walking across a forbidden bridge for pedestrians (it was a bridge only for the tram…oh, well). That was fun; but then I went in a completely wrong direction and did not turn around until maybe 15 minutes of walking and realizing that the path kind of ended and the bridge I was looking for was nowhere in sight. Thankfully, I found someone who spoke a little English to tell me I was extremely far from town and had to totally backtrack back to where I started. Not really trusting them (still thinking that I couldn’t be that far from the center), I asked another couple for directions to the center of town. They were incredulous that I was trying to get there by foot, and then proceeded to tell me the exact same thing as the other couple had told me. Okay, I was finally convinced, so I set off almost running as at this point I was running late. Thankfully, all went well. I even made it to my tour with a little time to spare. Thank the Lord I am a runner J
Ooh, walking around Prague…what a joy that was. Not only did Prague have an interesting downtown with many things to do, like restaurants and cafés, etc., it also had many large surrounding parks, one of which was famous for its hill, Petrin Hill, or the home of the Observation Tower, a smaller clone of the Eiffel Tower, but only quite different and quite smaller. I must say, though, that I think I liked the Observation Tower better than the Eiffel Tower, which may be heresy to say for a French major and a student in France, but the ambience is much more natural and there were no lines to get in and only a $3 charge to get to the top. What a deal for the beautiful view I saw.
The last thing I am going to mention is the Mucha Museum, which was dedicated to the artist Alphonse Mucha, who became popular in Paris at the end of the 19th century, but is revered by the Czechs as someone who did a lot to preserve the pride and national heritage of not only the Czech people of the Slavs in general. The museum was small but very interesting, displaying many of his works on advertising posters which he completed in Paris, New York and the Czech Republic during a span of many 40 years. I remember getting a card from one of my aunts a few years ago that exhibited a lovely woman called Princess Hyacinth. I kept the card because I really enjoyed the picture, it being of a red-head and all (although I just found out that she is not a red-head but is a brunette with a circle of red flowers around her head!), and now I have discovered the artist of the picture and learned about his life. I think those moments of surprise connections are very interesting and make for some interesting and long-lasting memories since the points that had just been connected in fact span many years and many experiences in between. My trip to Prague really was a completion of some known points – I have long wanted to visit Prague – and some unknown –Mucha’s genius and his creative posters that revolutionized the art nouveau style during his time. I must say, though, that I missed France while I was gone…