Prague...the story so far....

We arrive on Sunday late afternoon after an easy-ish journey.  I say ish because Andrew had a case of boredom and I had my nose in a book which put us at cross purposes some of the time.  Matters were not improved by the difficulty in obtaining a ticket for the tram as tickets could only be bought from machines which took coins, and freshly arrived we had no coins (i'm really beginning to see the highlights of having a single European currency having changed currency 3 times in one week!).  We therefore had to make a couple useless purchases of water to get coins and pissed off the kiosk guy by only having big notes.  Well we finally got the tram and were treated to a great view of the Castle on our way in.  We found our hostel OK and were greated by a very surly receptionist which made me wonder if we weren't still in Russia! having dumped our stuff we then set out to explore. 

Prague is really a very beautiful city and although I had visited 10 years ago I remember very little having spent most of my time in bed with acute tonsilitis (thankfully this cannot happen this time the offending organs having been removed shortly after that holiday).  The city was occupied by the Nazis early on in WW2 and as a result survived the war mostly intact apart from one bomb dropped by the Americans who thought they were flying over Dresden! The city therefore has kept it's stunning mixture of Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque and Roccoco architecture making it a visual feast simply just walking around.  The drawback is that it is incredibly touristy.  nearly everyone strolling around is a tourist and all businesses seem to be in some way connected to catering for the masses of sightseers.  We took a walking tour this morning which showed us round the major sights of the Old town, Jewish quarter (intact as Hitler wanted to preserve it as a museum of an Extinct Race), Charles Bridge and the Castle.  The weather is hot and sunny so lots of photo opportunities were taken advantage of (together with the other million tourists).  We are now feeling a little touristed out and tomorrow are going to take it more easy and see a couple of small museums.  On wednesday we are going to hire a car to see some smaller (and hopefully less crowded) towns in the region.  Will update you with piccies of those as they come through. 

Right, off to sample more Czeck stuff.... the beer and wine...

Kath

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