Prague, Part 2: This place is Czech-cellent

Witty puns, man. Czech me out.


Cliffnotes of the Day:

• I took one of those free walking tours today - I took one with the same company in Dublin, and I'm beginning to love them. We walked through Old Town and the Jewish Quarter and our guide was massively entertaining.  Our tour was huge, it was like 50 people, but everyone was super nice, and history FTW.
• On the tour, I met Amy - another girl traveling the world solo, from Atlanta. It's so refreshing to kind of meet someone in the same boat. Most travelers I've met so far are from England or Australia (really....only those two) who are on an extended holiday or doing a gap year, and to them, it's totally normal to take a year off to travel (they're all also like, 20 years old, but that's a separate issue). So to meet someone who I could relate to (the backpacking thing, the not-working thing, the solo female traveling thing, etc.) was awesome.  She's blogging her own travels on her website here.
• After our tour, Amy and I explored Prague Castle together. It's apparently the largest ancient castle in the world. And it's awesome because different parts were built at different times, so it looks like all these totally different buildings cobbled together - there doesn't seem to be any kind of unifying theme with any of the buildings. 

Prague Castle!

The cathedral in Prague Castle

Tiny adorable houses in Prague Castle. I am appropriately-sized for a Czech person circa 1400

Enjoying the view from the top. It feels good to look down at the plebes

• Don't ask, but I had people encourage me to do one of those pub crawls that every city has. It's something I probably wouldn't have done before, but apparently it's a good thing to do if you're traveling alone. I seriously thought I could just go and have a drink. Lesson #1 is is that there is no such thing as a pub crawl in moderation - every bar had these platters of shots that they'd have you drink before you went inside. The last couple bars, I was cheers-ing and then secretly dumping my shot on the floor. My apologies to the bars that discovered random puddles of vodka all over the room. It was fun, though, and I got to see a gorgeous nighttime view of the castle and Charles Bridge:

This looked much prettier in person, I swear

Meal of the Day:

We tried a Czech pastry called Trdelník.  It's a huge sugar-covered pastry shaped like a hose: the kind firemen use to extinguish large fires, not those wimpy garden hoses. And then they coat the inside in Nutella. This may or may not have been my dinner.

Lady turning trdelniks on their spit

Please ignore that in addition to a giant trdelnik, we are also clutching ice cream cones #vacationdiet

Fun Facts of the Day:

• Prague is one of the few cities in Europe that's managed to be preserved through all the wars, bombings, etc. (partly due to Hitler wanting to preserve it, but whatever).  That's why it looks so pretty, and you can see so many different examples of buildings/architecture from all the time periods.  Most other European cities have been super reconstructed.
• There are people in the Czech Republic that have lived through the area changing countries 7 different times. Can you believe that?? You're just living there, minding your own business, and BOOM suddenly your country changes to an entirely different country, with different government, currency, etc. Also, I find it mind-blowing that I remember when it was Czechoslovakia (it was on Carmen Sandiego when I was a kid). Am I the only one who finds it super, super fascinating when big historical things happened while I was alive??! 
• Czech people drink the most beer, on average, compared to every other country in the world. Even Ireland. Way higher than Ireland.  I've never had so much Pilsner in my life.
• "Hello" in Czech is "Dobry den!" The only reason I can remember this is because it kind of sounds like "Dobby den", a la Harry Potter's house-elf, and I imagine Dobby (not dead, of course) in a small den-like cave filled with socks. 
• Czech escalators are ridiculously fast. I was staring at one in the metro station today, debating whether I should try and video the up/down escalators zooming at breakneck speed. I didn't in the end, but take my word for it - it's borderline theme park ride. Take a Scottish double-decker bus (front row) and a Czech escalator, and you've got yourself a day.

Prague: Kind of freakishly gorgeous

I've been accused of overusing phrases/descriptors like "the best", "my favorite", "amazing", "life-changing", "cutest", etc., etc. So I'm trying to dial it back, or at least give the smallest indication as to what is actually great and what isn't.

That being said, PRAGUE IS THE BEST. It is seriously one of the prettiest places ever; I spent the entire afternoon just wandering aimlessly through the cobbled city streets and getting lost in all the tiny nooks and corners.

Old Town Square. Is it possible to look prettier.

What It's All About:
Prague is a fairytale-looking, gorgeously-appointed, Disney-like town with that Eastern European flair.


Cliffnotes of the Day:

• Wandered the city streets around Old Town Square
• Climbed the clocktower, which has a famous astronomical clock which still works and apparently tells time due to science/physics/astrology/wizardry.  I could barely understand any of the plaques explaining how it works; I could only understand that the fact it works is a big complex deal, so my conclusion is that it's magic.  It strikes every hour, which people come to watch - basically, on the hour, the skeleton of Death rings a bell and the 12 apostles come out to say hi - none of which I would have understood if I hadn't read it in my guidebook. 

View of Old Town Square from the top of the clocktower

Asian tourist level = high

View of the crowd that gathers in front of the clocktower, on the hour

The famous/magic/sorcerous astronomical clock 

Walked along the famous Charles Bridge at sunset.

A romantic sunset photo with myself

*heart-eyed emoji*

Meal of the Day:
Rick Steves' guidebook sent me to this ridic Czech restaurant named after a legend about a rope-maker who strangled his wife (charming!). The guidebook also recommended I get the pork leg with mustard, which I did and it was GIANT. The kindly French couple sitting next to me even politely asked me what the hell I ordered.

This menu was out of control and I loved it

The largest meat slab ever for dinner

The restaurant's legend. I couldn't find the rope-maker's wife's photo in the pub. Is this a problem

MVP of the Day:

On the train from Berlin to Prague, I hadn’t booked a reserved seat (bc it was 5 Euros extra, and people assured me I’d be ok without one), and I was slightly late because a choco croissaint was calling my name.  Well, it wasn’t ok.

It was single-handedly the most chaotic, crowded, out-of-control train I’ve ever been on in my life.  People were jammed in every single hallway, in between the cars, outside the bathrooms, etc. And not having a reserved seat, I got stuck standing with my giant awkward backpack while people all tried to squeeze by me.  It’s a 4-hour train ride, and I was kind of panicking about having to stand the whole way. 

However, I met a German man who was incredibly nice to me and tried to help me find a seat (albeit unsuccessfully). But then, during a quick train stopover in Dresden (2.5 hours in), he came and found me and told me to follow him. I’m not kidding, he led me and my giant unwieldy backpack through 3 or 4 train cars, asking every single person if they had a free seat next to them. When he finally found a woman sitting next to a free seat being occupied by her GIANT suitcase, he single-handedly rearranged all the luggage in the overhead compartment, hauled this woman’s T-rex-sized suitcase up there, and then offered me the seat.  It was the nicest thing ever, and I could have cried. Later on, he bought a large beer for himself, came over and poured me a cup, and cheers'd me. We chatted a little throughout the entire ordeal; his name is Michael, he's German, and lives in Kazakhstan working as a lawyer.  

When we got off the train, he looked at me and went, "Connie - best of luck to you in all your adventures", and then walked away. Ugh. THE. NICEST. Bless you, German lawyer angel.