Tag Archives: czech republic

alright, so we made our way back to prague – we ended up walking about 2 miles along the railroad tracks to the main station because there weren’t many trains running – i felt like i needed a red bandana and a stick.

one more thing about prague – the main station is the armpit of the earth. i remember getting off here a couple years ago and thinking ‘why did i come here’. it’s full of bums of neon lights and casinos. it’s a shame, because upstairs there is a beautiful art nouveau dome. my guide book said you could get a cup of coffee at the cafe and watch male prositutes selling their wares. i didn’t see any, oh well.

walked around admiring the square at night – oh – and on this weekend, there was a basketball tournament called the ‘european final four’. i think it was the euroleague – teams from greece, germany, spain, italy, russia, israel…to name a few. there was an impromptu pep rally for the israeli team on the main square. they were beating drums and singing, etc etc. all around the city, you would see people with scarves of their teams around their necks – kind of like for soccer games.

i love these little baroque pastel houses:

tyn church is even more foreboding at night:

town hall tower w/ cheesy astronomical clock:

alright, so the next morning (sunda) i had to check out at 11. i got up early to head over to the jewish quarter, since i didn’t spend much time there last time and i wanted to get into some of the synagogues and the cemetery. actually it’s a good thing to do on a sunday morning because since it’s jewish, it’s open…

from 1439-1787 this was the only burial ground allowed for the jews of prague. it’s a very small space – maybe less than a block in area – and since the custom says the body should not be moved once buried, the graves/tombs were piled on top of one another til it became about 12 feet above street level. there are 12,000 people buried there. as the earth settled over time, the stones became crooked.

it was a rainy, somber cool morning indeed. so i walked back to the square, took another snap of the tyn church:

and went inside and caught part of the 10am mass, from the back of the church. couldn’t take pictures inside – so no photos – but it was beautiful and even though i didn’t know what was going on, it was neat to watch.
well – my going in must have done some good because when i walked out, the clouds were GONE and the sun was out in full shine – it was gorgeous!
old town hall – note the right side of the pink facade – bombed out during WW2.

baroque hussite church, church of st. nicholas:

not so gloomy anymore – adam and eve towers of tyn church:

my favorite pastel houses again:

walking towards the charles bridge from the square:

i made my way along the bridge – the merchants populate this thing during the sunny days, selling stuff to tourists – i usually go for the artists with the lithographs of the city sights or watercolors – and i think last time i got this neat little ceramic flute (that i have no idea how to play but it’s beautiful). this is the place to see the view of prague castle, where the czech president lives:

the bridge is lined with statues like this one – that all have stories to tell:

caught the tram on the other side of the bridge and went up to the botanical gardens on the way to the castle. took a nice walk through the gardens to spy on st vitus cathedral, first sone laid in 1344 – and home to the tomb of st wenceslas (from the christmas carol) and the bohemian crown jewels:

pictures stop here – i walked over to the main gate, where a lot of the crowds gather. took a seat on the fountain next to the 3 guys called “Prague Castle Orchestra”. they’ve been playing the castle square for years – the self proclaimed smallest orchestra in the world. the music was perfect for admiring the beautiful castle grounds, watching the changing of the guard, and looking over the city.
after a brief sit – made my way back to the tram and found my way back to the guest house (one last long ass walk up that hill from the river). i had about a 4 hour train ride to my next destination, in the very southern part of bohemia, also along the vltava river – cesky krumlov.

so, i haven’t really talked much about what i did while i was overseas – it’s one of those things – you’re gone for so long and when you get back there is so much to tell that you end up not wanting to talk about it – or so many people ask you questions you tell the same thing over and over again.
i finally got my snaps uploaded and need to actually take the time to write captions and remember stuff – so here’s the first installment – 4.28 & 4.29

PRAGUE
got to prague pretty late – got delayed from CLT by 2 hours and missed the connection in frankfurt, had to camp out in the airport for 4 hours. by the time i got to prague, i was tired and sick (from the laryngitis i got right before the trip) – couldn’t have found a better place to stay – nice little 12 room guest house in a residential neighborhood. did the hostel thing when i stayed in prague for a week in 04, and pretty much never left the old town/castle area. this time was different – got some peace and quiet and things were cheaper!! it rained and was miserable for those first couple of days, so i was glad to know my way around and just be able to relax and do whatever, not on a schedule.

the tyn church on old town square – pretty bleak looking, architecture echos the weather:

more blah – gate to charles bridge, actually without crowds

prague castle, which is one of the most beautiful skylines in europe i think (obviously not represented in this snap)

Alright – the next day – off on a side trip to

KUTNA HORA

I heard about this place last time from a hostelmate – we tried to go out there but in 04 my czech wasn’t as good as it was this time (oh it still sucks but it was way better). seriously, the more you travel, the mo’ better you learn to get around

so, i found it in a book and read about it and had it all figured out. basically, KH is a small old silver mining town that gets a few tourists. the weird thing here was the Sedlec Ossuary. bones of 40,000 people decorate the inside of this church. ok it sounds weird, but there is a good story that goes along with it. so, back in the 13th century, a monk from Sedlec visited the holy land and brought back some dirt. he sprinkled the dirt in the area that was once the cemetery (where the bone church is now). all the silver mining rich people wanted to be buried in the cemetery when they passed because of this – cue the plague in the 1300s and the hussite wars after that and you had a heck of a lot of bodies in one small space. so in the 16th century they dug a bunch of people up, built a gothic church on the site, and later added a baroque style entrance. the bones from the skeletons were literally piled in heaps in the basement – the ossuary. til one day in the 19th century a family told a carpenter to “straighten up”. this is what he did:

the chandelier – which contains at least one of each type of bone in the human body – weird…

dont worry no plans to redecorate my house:

On some of the skulls you could actually see holes and cracks – where the warriors were struck on the head during battle and died… It was something to stand there and look at all of the skulls and imagine them as real people and what their lives must have been like and what they looked like.

coat of arms of the family (schwarzenburgs) that, er, commissioned the, er, art.

and the artist left his mark:

in this small po-dunk czech town:

that was about it for kutna hora. ate at neat place called Pivnice Dacicky – good local czech beer and lots of medieval style food (read: meat). the walls were covered with medieval murals and the tables were large and heavy wooden ones with benches. the cool thing – a local wedding party popped in and we got to clap and sing with some italians. had no idea what was going on. i think i wrote about this before – sounded like happy birthday to me. wish i would have gotten some pictures….what was i thinking. anwyay, was neat to get involved with some of the local customs!!!

next installment – finishing up in prague and off to cesky krumlov!

greetings from olomouc, cz.

i arrived here via a really cute little town called cesky krumlov.  had i known better, i would have spent another lazy day there and not come to olomouc.  in krumlov i stayed at a nice little hostel, hostel99.  on the walk down to the hostel, i met a canadian named allie, from edmonton.  that is the best thing about traveling alone – you always manage to meet up with other solo travelers and have a good time.  i’ll spare you the details of the first night – but let’s just say i woke up the next morning and wondered where a few bruises came from.  namely, why was my middle toe on my right foot purple and looking funny?  ah, the battle wounds.

the next night we ended up hanging in the hostel for the most part, playing cards and drinking beer.  finally, i found some more americans – austin from atlanta and justin from dallas.  i think one of them walked in while we were in the middle of one game and we all had our fingers up our right nostrils and speaking with bad chinese accents - a few of the ‘rules’ of our game.

yesterday morning started off with another breakfast at hospoda99.  i am not sure what is wrong but my appetite since i came to europe has not been the same – at home i can eat and eat and eat but here i just don’t have the drive.  anyway, good thing i did not eat too much because the bus ride back to cesky budejovice was hell on wheels.  the driver had a big afro and looked a little crazed.  i think his name must have been Otto – he looked like one.  Otto the driver on the bus to hell.  his driving was like his hair – erratic.  the whole time i was sure i was going to lose my breakfast – but i kept thinking, ’he drives like this everyday whether you are on his bus or not’.  so i figured he must know what he is doing.

we arrived in cesky bud and allie and i said goodbye.  i am so proud of myself - i managed to buy a bus ticket all by myself and get on the right bus.  you dont understand how hard that can be when no one speaks english and you dont want to get screwed.  the bus ride was 4.5 hours.  when we stopped in Trebic for a break, the Czech girl sitting in front of me spoke to me – and she knew english…  her name was Eva and she lives near Brno – where the bus was going – she was super nice, and her english was very good.  she had been visiting her boyfriend in Cesky Bud and was on her way home.  turns out that he is going to be spending the summer in Tennessee – of all places – i wish i had met him before the bus left but oh well.

so we arrived in Brno, where i impressed myself again by finding the train station – a short walk from the bus station.  another 1.5 hours by train and i am in olomouc.  though, i would NEVER recommend arriving in a town after hours – about 9pm – with no room reservation and a guidebook with a shitty map.  there were a few times i was wandering around in the dark and wanted to cry.  like i said before, this is NOT a touristy town, so it was rather difficult to find a place to stay.  i did find one – but i dont like it and i didnt really have much choice.  oh well.  that is what i get for not printing out directions to the hostel that i wanted to be at.

i cannot wait to get out of here – speaking of that, it is time to look at the train schedule and get a ticket to get out of here….  bye for now.

greetings from prague.

after a 2 hour delay from charlotte, resulting in a missed flight and a 4 hour layover in frankfurt, i finally made it to rainy prague. the first thing i saw from the air over prague was not the castle – it was a huge IKEA store. figures!!

not much was happening the first night – it was drizzling pretty hard – plus i was operating on 5 hours of sleep in about 72 hours. so, i just hopped a tram to the old town, walked around for a bit, and headed back to my base, Guesthouse Lida. on the way i found a good little restaurant and had some yummy pork tenderloin and potatoes in cream sauce. mmmm. then it was off to bed for the best 12 hour sleep ever!

up at 7 – down to charles bridge to meet up with a friend – and after some VERY broken czech and gambling that we were getting on the right train, we headed for a small town about 70km away, called Kutna Hora. near the town there is an old church that is decorated with human bones. yes, it sounds like an episode of trading spaces gone bad (even i dont think Hildi has it in her…). you can read more about the ossuary here (wait til you see the pictures): http://www.kostnice.cz/

then it was off for a 2 mile walk into the main town – nothing much was going on – it was pretty deserted. we found a neat little restaurant – the tables were old and wooden and there were medevial images on the wall. i still dont understand if i am supposed to wait for a hostess to seat us or what. it is pretty awkward sometimes. here i had the best bowl of onion soup with some cheese and croutons. the menu was a vegetarian’s nightmare! everything from ostrich to ox tongue to duck to turkey…not sure if they had turducken though! i opted for turkey and some potato dumplings and red cabbage. mmmm…it was good too, as was the Budvar! then, in the middle of lunch, in walks a woman in a lavendar/blue dress, and a man in a suit – it was a wedding party. then i got really nervous – i thought that we had invaded a wedding reception without knowing it. luckily, it became apparent that the other people in the room with us were also tourists (italians?) with a group. the wedding party made a toast, to which the italians(?) sang a song which to me sounded like happy birthday! after that, one of the waitresses brought a big napkin and tied it around the newly married couple’s necks – like a big bib! they they gave them a giant bowl of soup and they had to feed each other. i guess that is kind of like what we do with wedding cake? anyway, it was interesting and a really cool cultural thing to see.

after that, there was more walking about the town, then we tried to catch a local train back to the main train station – to no avail. so we made like hobos (all i was missing was the stick with the bandana tied to it) and walked back to the main train station along the tracks (about 2 miles). oh. the other interesting (or not so interesting) thing about Kutna Hora is that it has a giant Philip Morris plant. it is the headquarters for PM central europe…weird. we had to pass that near the train station.

back in prague, there was more walking to be done – i really wanted to go to the black light theater show but did not make it. i had some wonderful spaghetti bolognese for dinner! it got pretty cold last night – down to about mid 30s.

it drizzled again this morning – which can be quite depressing! but, i got up anyway and headed out to the jewish quarter. last time i was here i did not go into any of the synagogues. this time i did – one of them has the names of thousands of czech jews that were killed by the nazis written on the walls. they began this in 1959 – then the communists shut the synagogue down and erased the names. they put them back up in 1989 – and after the floods they had to rewrite them in 2003! i wandered through the old jewish cemetery – there are thousands upon thousands of jews buried here, up to 12 layers high. the stones are all jumbled do to ground settling – i guess it was sort of spooky since it was so cloudy and rainy outside!

after that, it was back up to old town square to watch the astronomical clock (it’s just something you have to see each time you are there). then i went into the Tyn Church (it’s the big gothic looking one) and watched a mass! apparently there was some divine intervention because when i came out, the sun was shining and the skies were blue, perfect for some last pictures around the square and the charles bridge.

i hopped a tram back up to the prague castle to wander through the gardens and out to the castle gate, where i sat on the steps of the fountain and listened to the 3-man-self-proclaimed-worlds-smallest-symphony-orchestra the Prague Castle Orchestra. they were very good!

and here i am now, back in the hotel, waiting to go to the train station to catch my afternoon train down to cesky krumlov….