prAgue

So I believe that we left you all in Germany. we safely arrived in Prague. However, when we arrived, I was a bit...surprised. You all know that we were quite spoiled with our amazing train station in Berlin--well the train station that we arrived into here in Prague was a bit...dingy. Eric commented later, "That must have been how the people felt when they arrived at the concentration camp," -- ok probably not THAT bad...but definitely the worst we have encountered so far. we even had a problem locating the exit...signage was not it's strong point. really, to be truthful...i don't think it had any strong point. oh well we had arrived and that was all that mattered.

Our next encounter of Prague was this little sidewalk...and by little I mean absolutely tiny. As in you could basically get one foot in front of the other and thats about it. To be truthful i'm not even sure it was a sidewalk...but we made it into one. Amanda said she was nervous she'd trip there. b/c if you'd trip there you'd end up flat on the road ran over by a car. BUT, (Parents: Deep Sigh) we all conquered the sidewalk/curb safe and sound.

We arrived at our hostel about twenty minutes later. This hostel is costing us about 7 dollars a person per night, and we aren't surprise why. :) We walked in and it was very plain and the rooms are a little musty, and it's definitely nothing special. but...it's a hostel and it gets the job done so we are happy. plus our pocketbooks are a little fuller so we are double happy. Ironically...this place has the best showers so far--go figure?

Once we got all checked in we decided to go explore the city. We found our way to the Charles Bridge which has an amazing view. The river is beautiful...and it was probably around 6 or 7 so the sun was going down which made it even better. It also had a great view of the Prague Castle which is settled up on this large hill. Super beautiful. --yes pictures will come. While crossing this large bridge there was this great little violin (and other assorted musical instruments that i'm not knowledgeable enough to name) playing. Amanda really enjoyed them and wanted to tip them. we hadn't made it to a cash machine yet (czech republic isn't on the euro) so she ended up tipping in Euro's. We weren't sure if that was rude but we figured money is money, you can't be picky.

Once we got money and we decided we were going to live the rich life and have a nice little dinner on the riverside. We knew that we would be paying for this wonderful view and atmosphere but we didn't care. After our dinner--I had goulash...i guess here that consists of four little pieces of meat, some sauce, and lots of onion (and that's it), we decided to go walk around some more.

We found this large area that had a big screen up that plays the World Cup games. It is up for the whole time teh games are going--like all five weeks. It was a fun little atmosphere.

The next day we decided to go on the FREE WALKING TOUR!! YAY. lol. It was pretty good like always, however the tour guide we had this time was a little bit silly and animated for our (at least Eric and I's) liking. We then toured the Jewish Quarters. The most memorable thing for me was the Pinkas Synagogue. It has the names of 77,000 Czech Jews that were murdered in the Holocaust listed on the walls. The other part of is has artwork that children who were housed in the nearby concentration camp Terezin (sp?) drew. They had very limited art supplies but they were able to have some. It was interesting to see what they drew. Some had artwork depicting the sad times they were facing (trains, bunks, concentration camp, etc) while others had pictures of betters times (life before camp, what they would do when they were free, etc). Very moving and very sad. We also saw the Jewish Cemetry. Apparently the Jews were restricted to stay in the Jewish Quarter. They eventually needed more space to bury their dead but they weren't allowed it. So they were forced to bury their dead on top of previous dead resulting in a crazy looking cemetry. We were able to walk around in it and it was really quite eery. Afterwards we got gelato...not sure if it's better than ice cream...but still delicious=--and reasonable priced :)

Later that night we went to this Black Light Theatre. It was absolutely fantastic and really fun. I can't even really think of how to describe it but it was definitely one of the highlights of the trip so far. They use black light and dancers to put on one heck of a show.

The next day (today) we went to the Castle area. You have to cross the Charles Bridge area to get there so we got to see the pretty view from there. Then once you get across --remember I said the castle is settled up on a huge hill--well then you get to walk up the super steep sidewalks!! yay!! haha not really but it wasn't too bad. got us a little workout in for the day. So when we finally got to the top it was breathtaking. The city is beautiful--i really liked the architecture. So we saw the Old Palace, the huuuge Cathedral, the Prague Castle, The powder tower (use to keep ammunition there), few Basilica's, etc. All very beautiful.

that took us about 5 hours. when we were done we went and got some amazing pizza. pizza is big here apparently. then we hit up the chocolate store--we were going to do the chocolate museum b/c we thought it was free but there was an entrance charge. so us being the smart people that we are decided to just use the money for the entrance fee and just buy chocolate instead. We then went to find this little park we had read about. Instead we ended up in the back of a little cafe. I made the call and decided good enough. We spent about an hour there just basking in the sun (Eric napping in the shade) and enjoying being in Prague. Amanda then decided to override me so we again went looking for the park. I'm really glad she did override that decision b/c we found the park and it was super beautiful. AND it had peacocks in it AND the peacock fluffed it's feathers! how fuN! lol. there was also an all white one--we didn't quite know what that was but we relaly liked it.

Well we are off to Vienna in the morning. We will be staying with Mollie and Amanda's grandma's cousin--who we have never met--but am excited to do so.

Hopefully there we will be able to get some pictures up for you!!

PS: We know that you all like hearing what we are doing....we also like hearing what you are doing back home :) so shoot us a message!!