The adventure begins

We departed Cork Tuesday afternoon, arriving in a night time Prague after a short three hour plane ride. Riding in from the outskirts of the city, I could already tell by the lit up spires and domes that Prague was going to be a beautiful place. Our taxi took us to the Old Town Square, off of which was our hotel -- the Hotel Metamorphis. The hotel was nice, small with a canopied cafe right out front. The best part of our room, I think, was the view. Directly across from our windows stood a great Cathedral with windows framed in high relief sculptures.



Here is the interior courtyard of the hotel.

We could also see the towers of another nearby Cathedral from our hotel.

The view may seem obscured, but no worries. The towers were perfectly visible from the other side, standing within the Square. We passed this door of the cathedral every day to enter Prague. I thought it was impressive in and of itself.

Wednesday, we woke up early for breakfast before our guided tour of Prague city. Breakfast was always interesting. I always ate way too much, but the dishes were so interesting. They always had some kind of egg dish, whole fresh fruit, different types of breads, meats, and cheeses. They even had a loaf of bread shaped like a lamb laying down. My favorite was probably the spinach pancakes - more like spinach wrapped in a crepe. We also had the pleasure of complaining everyday to one another about the tiny tiny glasses. They held about two swallows of juice. We eventually began pouring multiple cups for ourselves.

Our tour lasted from about 10 to 4, if I recall correctly. So we covered a lot of the city. Our guide took us past many churches and synagogues, as well as a few sites of literary interest.

I ended up taking a lot of pictures of buildings he didn't even point out, simply because they all look amazing. These are buildings around the Old Town Square.


There was a market up in celebration of Easter.

Prague's famous astrological clock also stood off the square. The clock tower always had a huge group of tourists flocking around the base, taking pictures.







Obviously, I was very enamored with the clock and took a billion pictures.
The building connected to the tower was one of the few that sustained damage from bombing during the war. Prague as a whole luckily remained relatively intact.

While telling us this. Our guide then pointed out the white cobblestone crosses at our feet. These represent a group of people executed outside the building during the war.

I was taking a picture of the market, but also captured how appropriately disturbed we all were at this information.

Eventually we traveled out of the Square.

We came to this old synagogue, now a museum. Most of the synagogues were museums. I think one was still functioning. Our guide explained how tons of Jewish artifacts had been gathered by the Nazis. They planned to keep such artifacts as relics of an extinct species. Apparently, when Prague was low on money, the city sold off parts of their collection, but I think they still have the largest in the world.


The synagogues generally had cemeteries attached to them. As Jews were only allowed so much land to bury their dead, they began stacking them in layers. Prague would cyclically flood and the soil from the river would be used to build up the land.

Attached to this synagogue, you can see how much higher the cemetery land is from the street.

One small cemetery had thousands buried in it with up to twelve layers of people.

This synagogue had one clock in Hebrew with letters instead of numbers and moving in a counter-clockwise direction. I think the synagogue pictured below is the one still functioning.

This is just one of the many pretty buildings decorated with gold shiny bits and lots of sguiggles.

My camera made this street look extremely wobbly. The buildings were actually much straighter.

Our guide eventually led us to the famous Charles Bridge, flanked on one side by Charles Tower.

The entire bridge is lined with sculptures and about a million vendors.




Many of these pictures are from the innumerable times I crossed the bridge. Every day I think.


Later in the day we would go traverse the river on a dinner boat, much like this one.

This synagogue held an extremely creepy baby Jesus doll that was known for curing diseases. Apparently, desperate mothers occasionally bring their children in hopes of a miracle. I liked the building's spirally architectural decor.

Here we have the strange Mika bird flying down the street. Our guide had nothing to say on the subject.

You have to watch out for the trams in Prague. They come out of nowhere and I don't think they'd feel remorse for running over tourists.

More cathedrally goodness.


All the large doors of the city have some kind of amazing embellishments on them. Like so...

Our guide walked us past the graffiti wall memorial to John Lennon.


We eventually came to a palace, but I was too busy checking out the ceiling of this spectacular stage to hear what our guide had to say about it.



This is unfortunate, as the courtyard contained a building covered in fake stalactites. I heard our guide mention something about wanting the place to look really grand and fantastical.




The area also contained a garden.

With peacocks! And a white one too!!




Edward, Mika, Laurie, Sarah, and I were momentarily lost from the rest of the group as we lagged behind looking at the fountain. But we found each other eventually.
After the tour, the same lolligaggers went for lunch at a place called Pilsner Urquell. Pilsner is apparently Prague's beer of choice. It's strong, bitter, and gross. Laurie and Edward liked it, which I think says something about their characters. Hee hee,just kidding.


I had goulash in a bread bowl.



Last but not least was our night time boat ride. It was relaxing and nice. Even if our boat got stuck on the side of the bank while we were in line to go through a lock.


The boat served some complimentary Czech drink with too many consanants to pronounce. It tasted like an extremely alcoholic red hot. I took about one sip and was done. Definitely not my cup of tea. My cup of tea was much nicer.



I returned to the hotel exhausted and happy.
Tune in tomorrow for day two!