You may say I'm a dreamer

On Saturday, our second day in Prague I got another view of the city. This time our bus2alps guides brought us to all of the most famous places to see whilst in Prague. This was exciting because these are the places which give a city its heart and soul, and its character. The entire weekend was overcast and snowy, which made the scenes (to me) all the more beautiful. 

Other than a far away view of the Charles bridge, our first real stop was the John Lennon wall. This used to just be a normal wall with nothing making it the famous place it is today until the late 1980's when young Czechs would write their sorrows and grievances on the wall during the communist regime in the country. This led to a clash between hundreds of students and the security police on the Charles Bridge. This movement was described as "Lennonism" and now is a symbol for peace and love when back in the 80's it was more of a symbol for western culture. 

John Lennon never actually visited this wall because it was started in his memory after he passed away. But it was very cool to see all of the beautiful colors and writings of inspiration on the wall. My friend Rachel brought a marker and we all signed our names on the wall, which was so amazing because even though eventually our names will be covered up with more paint and graffiti they will always be there as a part of history.  

Signing the wall!

In front of the wall

Right down the street from the John Lennon Wall was a bridge with thousands of locks of love hooked to it. These locks could be hooked on by couples for the most part or by families or anyone who feels love.

For ever and always

Next up on our itinerary of places to see was the Charles Bridge (Karluv Most). It is a famous historic bridge that crosses the Vltava River in Prague. Its construction started in 1357 and finished in the beginning of the 15th century. It was the only means of crossing the Vltava until 1841, the Charles Bridge was the most important connection between Prague Castle and the city's Old Town and adjacent areas. 

This was a pretty cool bridge with a lot of statues and sculptures aligning the sides of it. There were also a lot of street vendors looking to either sell you pictures or to entertain you. The coolest guy on this bridge was the one man band, he sang and played a plethora of instruments, which was very intriguing to watch.

On the Charles Bridge

Part of the city in the background and the Charles bridge

Charles Bridge

Street view of Prague

 After a couple of hours taking in the more well known sites of Prague our trip leaders took us to get some lunch. It was pretty interesting because it was in the heart of the city and was as authentic a Czech meal and diner I will probably ever get.

 The soup is the first picture and was fantastic, I practically licked my bowl clean. The second picture I was attempting bravery and I ordered the goulash, although not my cup of tea it was pretty good nonetheless. The third picture was the best, authentic apple strudel pie YUM, I could not get enough of that it was so delicious. Our next destination was Prague Castle which was high above the city so I got a nice overlook of the entire city and the red roofed buildings. The Castle is very Gothic looking with gargoyles, crazy spires projecting from every direction and the dark colors.

A view from up by the castle

Another view looking down

The Czech guard

Side view of the castle, and my MSU sweatshirt

The castle was so large it was hard to get it all in one picture

Everything you see that looks like gold on this castle is real gold. 

 After being set free to explore the city on our own we were informed to take out or exchange money to Czech crown since they rarely took euro in most places. So this picture to the left is of my 1,000 Czech Crown, I looked like a big shot when I needed to pay for something with this. The currency exchange was so mind boggling to me. But after a long day of exploring the town, in  Old Town Square there were quite a lot of little food stands that sold either large sausages or pastries. Being curious I had to have some authentic Czech food from the stands (Reminded me of Pronto pups back home!).
This picture below was of their sausages they sold, it was stuffed with onions and put into a loaf of bread. This thing was huge and delicious, it was about the size of my head. I was so thrilled that this country had meat (since Italy is lacking in that department).

Enjoying our Czech Sausage

 Then for dessert I got something very similar in taste to an elephant ear. They were made on these big rolly things in the picture to the right. They were rolled on a stick like a dough-boy and coated with cinnamon and sugar. They were only 50 Czech crown, and they were so yummy. They were given to you to peal apart and eat, and they came out steaming hot. Especially since it snowed that day these things really his the spot and were a great ending to our trip in Prague.

Czech out Prague!

 

 I started off the weekend in a very interesting way, taking a 16 hour bus ride to Prague in the Czech Republic! Now the bus ride was uncomfortable and probably something that I will not do to that magnitude again. Attempting to sleep straight up against a freezing cold window and squished between the seats is not ideal of course but it can be nearly unbearable if I did not have the proper pillows or blankets with me. Still after that long haul up to Prague from my home port of Rome we arrived at 10 am on Friday morning. The hostel we stayed in known as the Czech Inn as it is called in the above picture was a pretty decent hostel. They had a free breakfast! The beds were also super comfy after that long bus ride.  The pictures below are just the pretty streets and the crazy Czech signs.

A pretty church on the way to old town Prague

The Parliament Building

 What I did most of Friday was tour the city, and Bus2alps was kind enough to provide a guide to show us around the city. Prague and the Czech people have been plagued with war for the past century and our guide had an interesting example. He said his grandma lived from around 1909 to the early 2000's, and within her lifetime she never left Prague, but within that time she lived in 8 different countries! 8 countries! That is at least how many times the city and the people have changed hands over the past century, it is quite a hard concept to grasp.

 The next couple of pictures are just some of the stuff we saw on our walking tour. The buildings were so colorful and what I liked most about them was that not one looked modern at all.

The picture to the left is of an old Gothic church, which was built behind the house infront of it. I find it absolutely amazing that they chose to build it in this fashion and conceal the beauty that is this church.

Old town square - my hair looks like a lion

Old town square

Another church from across the square from the other

This is the clock tower in Old Town square which was made with gold. It seems like everything of extreme significance in Prague had gold on it somewhere. 

The Clock tower with the church in the background

 This is the top circle of the clock and it tells the real time and date based on the stars. The figures on each side also move at specified times during the day. It was so beautiful to see.

 This picture is of the bottom circle of the clock which tells the name days for each day of the 365 days in the year along with the astrological signs. People also for a time had to name their kids after one of the names on this calendar otherwise their child might be taken until the name was changed.

Pretty buildings

Another view of the streets

Opera house

Many famous composers played here and a lot of them like Mozart have life like statues on top of the roof!

Another view of the streets

 This is the menu was from the place we ate for dinner and it gives an idea of some of the items on the menu. This place was just down the street from the Opera House and the last item on the menu I split with my roommate. This ended up being 360 Czech Crown (Czech Republic is not on the euro!). 100 Czech crown is 3.93 euro which is $5.17 in dollars. So this meal split between the two of us was 180 Czech Crown or $9.30!!! This is crazy because nowhere in the US would I be able to get roast duck for that cheap!

Our meal! Yummy!