It's a fantastic place to go and see. Even though it's cold, there's so much to see, you forget about the temperatures and just get excited about all the history.
I went to Prague with my friend Nab, and she was an excellent travelling companion! We made a great team, deciphering all the Czech language signs (AKA looking for the English ones...) and converting Czech Korunas into Pounds to work out if we were getting a good deal.
Lucky enough, there's tons of great deals in Prague, even in the mega - touristy areas. Nab and I managed to do the three days of eating and sightseeing without spending more than £60 each! So, if you want a holiday on a budget, I recommend it!
We found our holiday via Wowcher - an amazing website, if you've not used it before. Have a look at all the great travel offers they have going: here.
Transport
We stayed at a lovely hotel called the Hotel Saint George, which was really close to I.P. Pavlova station. From the airport, you can get a three day travelcard for about £8 which allows unlimited travel on any of the city's buses, trams, trains and the funicular! Oyster seems fairly extravagant now! As the hotel was so close to the station, we were able to do lots of sightseeing, with the comfort of a warm hotel room only a couple of train stops away.
Day 1
On the day of our flight (which left super early - the taxi came at 3.30am!), we were very tired and hungry when we arrived, so we dropped off our bags and went out for lunch to a fantastic little Cafe called Bio Zahrada, which was quite close to the hotel. It was such a lovely little shop - at the front it was a small home-run version of Planet Organic, and there were a few seats where you could sit and enjoy a delicious herbal tea, a freshly brewed coffee, or a delicious looking slice of cake - all made of fresh, organic, healthy ingredients. There were raw confections, wonderful healthy versions of traditional Czech treats, and it all looked fantastic.
At the back of the shop, there was space for lots of people to sit down and have a bite to eat. The cafe is open until 9pm Mon - Thurs, 10pm on Fri and 8pm on Saturday. It's closed on Sunday. They have a small selection of food on offer, but all of it is freshly made and delicious - so you know you're not getting anything microwaved or out of a packet. On our first day, I had a yummy cous cous salad, and Nab had a slice of quiche and salad. The lady who runs the shop was very friendly, and helped us decipher the menu. She also recommended a tea for me that was not yet on the menu - limeflower! It tasted delicious - a little like chamomile.
 |
| National Museum |
On the first day we also went and explored Wenceslas Square (named after the Good King himself!) Here we saw the National Museum (which is closed for renovation until 2015), and then had a look at the Jan Palach memorial (where a Czech student burned himself to death to start the revolution against communism). We enjoyed looking in all the shops that line the busy boulevard, and then checked out the little cafes at the end of the street.
The Jan Palach Memorial was little more than two bulges in the pavement that had been fashioned to look like a cross, but the story behind the memorial was quite something. When Jan Palach was only 20 years old, he decided to take a stand against communism and try to do something to make the Czech people begin an uprising. The plan was to burn one student every week until the communist regime was overthrown. On the appointed day, Jan Palach doused himself in petrol in one of the most famous squares in Prague, and set himself alight. However, he lived for three days after this. He told his fellow students - it's not worth it! His demonstration wasn't having the effect he wanted - the Czech people weren't (yet) beginning to stand up. Even though when he died he may have thought it was in vain, in truth, he began a worldwide movement, and eventually this fed back into the Czech psyche as people began to take their stand against communism. A very brave and noble man.
 |
| Jan Palach Memorial |
Day 2
Nab and I were so impressed with the hotel breakfast! Everything was on offer - cereal, toast, cake, pastries, fruit, salad (!), potato soup, porridge, eggs, sausages, meat, cheese etc. Wow.
We spent the second day exploring the Old Town. We crossed the historical and beautiful Charles Bridge, walked through the town and took the funicular railway up to the Strahov Monastery. Unfortunately, the signage wasn't brilliant up there, and we didn't actually make it to the Monastery. But we did enjoy a lovely walk through the woods there, and got to see squirrels being extremely adventurous, and a woodpecker, doing what he does best, and pecking at the wood.
At the top of the hill (called Petrin Hill), there is a lookout, designed to look a little bit like the Eiffel Tower. It's not quite as beautiful, I have to admit. But, it did serve as a good place to stop for a bite to eat, in the warmth, and I enjoyed a mozzarella and tomato salsa panini for the first time in years!
Both Nab and I were slightly dismayed to find that we had to pay to use the toilets. However, Nab got the better deal! As soon as we arrived at the top of Petrin Hill, I was looking for a loo. There were signs in front of the 'Eiffel Tower' monument that indicated a WC to the right, so we walked off to find a slightly morose looking outbuilding. Unappetising though this building was, I decided that if I was going to stay on the hill for any length of time, I was going to have to make use of it's services. Although only asking for 20 koruna, I was expecting a slightly nicer state of affairs than that which greeted me... Nab and I also commented on the people that ran the building (literally sitting in a room between the men's and women's toilets, with the TV on) probably had the most boring job we had ever thought of. Nab was lucky, and needed the loo later than I did. She ended up paying half the price to use the much nicer facilities inside the 'Eiffel Tower'. The 'WC' sign was put up to lure silly tourists like me to the outbuilding, thinking if there is a sign outside the building, there can't be toilets actually inside the building. Don't be fooled!
We walked part way down the hill and then jumped on the funicular to take us back down to the city. We then took a tram to get to Prague Castle, the biggest attraction in the city. It is enormous and so beautiful. Quite different to Buckingham Palace, so definitely a must-see. We walked around the huge complex, and enjoyed particularly St. Vitus' Cathedral. It's breathtaking, especially when it gets dark. The stained glass windows were amazing, with each fragment of glass being so very tiny and precise. The outside of the building is as pretty as the inside - there are mosaics everywhere, and one doorway we saw was entirely shrouded in gold that glinted whenever the sun peeked through the clouds. 
We also had time to see Golden Lane, which is within the castle complex. It's basically a street of Tudor looking small houses, where all the workers would have lived. It's been turned into lots of little shops now, and we spent some time exploring these. This is where I bought my postcards, and a magnet for Aunty Shirley! One of the shops was selling beautifully handmade cosmetics made out of Czech beer! Unbelievably, they smelled really good, and seemed to do my cold and dry hands good!
After having pondered the beauty of the city and the size of the world for a bit, overlooking Prague at night, we decided to walk back to the tram stop to head back to the hotel for a quick freshen up before we went out for dinner. We decided to go back to Wenceslas Square for dinner, as we had spied a lovely looking restaurant called COMO serving Italian and Japanese (weird combo, I know) food. It was really quite fancy looking, and yet the menu featured prices that wouldn't have been amiss in Pizza Express!
Nab decided she would go for the duck breast with apple puree, a fondant potato and sauteed green beans. As for me, it was time for a big bowl of pasta - I opted for a pasta Arrabiata with olives and parmesan, and a side salad. I was hungry from all that walking around! For dessert, we went for ice-cream, being too full to take anything else. Nab had her favourite, strawberry (which was very fruity!), and I had my favourite (vanilla) and tried a new flavour too (cinnamon). If anyone knows where to get cinnamon ice-cream in England, please let me know as it was absolutely divine.
Day 3
On our last day, we had to get up pretty early because we wanted to take a tour of the main sites to see in Prague. Amazingly, it was completely free and was fantastic!
In the morning, we were pretty tired as we had stayed up late the night before. We ended up quite rushed over breakfast and then check out. European hotels are great in that they seem to let you keep your luggage at the hotel before and after check out so you can do some exploring without being weighed down. Once we hit the train station, we were worried to see that part of the train line (the part that was due to take us back to the airport that night!) wasn't working. Oh no! But, we had bigger fish to fry right then, and made it on time to the tour starting point, right in the central square of Prague.
The tour was run by Sandeman's New Europe - and I booked it before we left using their website. We had a great tour guide called John Paul - he was really animated, and brought lots of the history of the town to life. We spent some time in the main square seeing a church that was the inspiration for Disney's Sleeping Beauty Castle, and the famous Astronomical Clock. It's an amazing piece of machinery, and has been keeping accurate time for over 600 years! It also tells you what time the sun will rise and set, and gives you the phase of the moon. It has a second component that tells you the season, the sign of the zodiac, and the day (along with the Name Day - which is why Europeans seem to have two birthdays!)The story of the man who made the clock is rather more macabre. As the King of Prague was so impressed with his new clock, he got his followers to creep up on the expert clock-maker in the middle of the night and cut out his tongue and gouge out his eyes! All this, just so that Prague would be the only place on Earth to have a clock this fabulous!
We also visited the 'Lego Preggo' - an interesting sculpture by the famous artist David Cerny. In the spirit of Czech 'rebirth', you could physically climb up inside this pregnant lady sculpture, and then be 'reborn'. Our tour guide had a particularly confident volunteer to demonstrate!Our guide also took us to the Jewish Quarter of Prague, which I would have loved to have spent more time in. Although it has now been rejuvenated, it was once in terrible condition, and very cramped. The other people of Prague would not give the Jews any more space to bury their dead even when their graveyard became full, so they had to pile up the Earth and bury 120,000 people in 15 layers in their cemetery. It was an awful place, in the true sense of the word - I stood their listening to our guide tell us the stories of bravery and hardship that people from this town had to endure, and I was truly awe-struck.
We took a very late lunch at Bio Zahrada once more, and then began our very long journey home. We ended up walking, taking two trains, taking a tram, walking again, taking a bus, and then the aeroplane and finally a car ride to get home!
Once I got home, I was tired, but very happy. The rest of the family were all up watching 'The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel', which I very much enjoy, so I sat downstairs snacking on (my favourite guilty pleasure!) Belvita breakfast biscuits before heading to bed. A super holiday and very much recommended for anyone who enjoys culture and history.
Enjoy today!
- rosinaviolets x
No comments:
Post a Comment