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CZ

So today is the last day of my secondary teaching career, but I'm going to rewind a bit. Back to Spring Break, the first full week in April. Saturday afternoon, I headed to Hartsfield and hopped on a plane bound for Prague to see Kate and Garrett! (Well, technically it was bound for Amsterdam... minor details. We only did two of the things listed in 36 Hours in Prague, but it was still an excellent trip.Upon my arrival Sunday morning, I showered and we headed out to Wenceslas Square, home to the Tyn Church and Prague's astronomical clock. There was also an Easter Market and a statue of Jan Hus, a pre-Luther Czech Reformer. Aside from the fact that it's been 6 weeks since then, I had also only slept about 4 of the last 30 hours and my memory of Sunday is a little fuzzy... From there, we walked across the Charles Bridge and found our way into the Wallenstein Gardens, where the Czech Senate and riding school are housed. along with this wall meant to resemble stalactites. We also visited a Czech pottery and jewelry store before heading to Cafe Architecture for dinner. Around this point, I my brain began to feel like I was adrift on the ocean, but a rousing game of Settlers helped keep me up until 9:30.

Monday morning, we slept in (well, I did- a full 12 hours!) and headed out around eleven to climb Petrin Hill. This statue is a memorial to the victims of communism. We took some sort of tram/tube-thingy up to the top. In the park at the top, we climbed the replica of the Eiffel Tower, whose top is as far above sea level as the real Eiffel Tower, but is only 200 some feet high. We played around in a house of mirrors and headed towards the Prague Castle. The last few blocks, we followed a unit of soldiers marching in formation. Unfortunately, there were barricades and security surrounding the main entrance, so we couldn't get in. It became clear that some sort of dignitary would soon arrive for some sort of ceremony. We waited around for awhile, saw some limos and important-looking, unfamiliar people arrive and decided to leave. From there we headed to Vyserad, where Kate and Garrett got engaged. Sadly, the cathedral is closed on Mondays, but we walked around the cemetery and found Dvorak's grave. There are some ruins of a medieval bath on the edge of the Vltava River and there's a large portion of the wall that once guarded Prague. I love such things.

Then, we headed back to the northern end of Prague to a football game: Slavia vs. Liberec. My first European football game. Since it was a Monday afternoon, it was pretty calm, but Kate and Garrett had some funny stories to tell. That night, we headed to the beer garden for dinner. They live a block from one of the largest parks in Prague, with a HUGE beer garden that had only opened for the season the week before. It was packed, but we grabbed the end of a table and indulged a leisurely meal of Czech libations and sausage. Until it started raining. Then it turned into something more like chugging and we tested the notion that you can make it back to their apartment in 2 minutes, running.

On to Kutne Hora tomorrow.

Labels: travel

posted by CP @ 5:53 PM 0 thoughts