Prague - Day 1
We're off to Prague today on the bus. The bus isn't until 10ish and Courts is awake at 6:30 so decides to go out for a run. It's nice and quiet this time of morning, not many people around. She runs around the nearby river and across the bridges, taking many rest stops to photograph the beautiful scenery. One rest stop is cut short as she is aggressively swooped by a crow and chased down the street. The time for that kilometre might be her quickest one yet.
Back at the apartment she wakes up Jeff and it's showers then breakfast. We've got breakfast included but it's at a nearby hotel that is far bougier than the one we are staying at. We gorge ourselves on the usual breakfast items of bread, eggs, yoghurt, muesli etc and average coffee. We finish packing and then set off for the bus depot. It's about a 20 minute walk and we complain most of the way. It's hot and our bags are starting to get heavy and we've been walking anywhere between 15-20km every day. We vow to have a more chill day when we get to Prague and utilise the public transport a bit more.
The bus ride is quick and relatively uneventful, Jeff sleeps most of the way. We arrive at Prague and are quickly taken with this beautiful city. We get off the bus and make our way to the tram, which seems to be the way to get around here. Buying a ticket seems easy enough and we're on our way. The closer we get to old Prague the prettier it gets. We hop off the tram and it's a walk across the bridge to our hotel. It's just amazing here. Our hotel is across the bridge on the other side of the more touristy area, but with a tram stop right on our doorstep so we're still very connected. We check in and get some tips from the lady at the front desk about what beer to drink and where to eat.
We put our feet up for a bit in the room while we work out a plan for this evening, that doesn't involve too much walking. Ok, enough moaning about our bruised feet, we hop on the tram and head to Prague's oldest brewery that is still in operation. It's huge with several different beer halls within. We grab a seat outside in the beer garden and the waiter comes by with a tray of beers and asks if we want light or dark. Amazing. We each get a dark beer as this is their signature beer and they've been using the same recipe for over 500 years. It goes down like water. We order some traditional Czech food which consists of goulash for Jeff and Morovian Sparrow (a pork in savory sauce) for Courts. Both served with a variety of bread dumplings. It's very homely and satisfying. Ok, one more beer (they're only $5 for 500ml!) and then it's time to explore some more.
We check out a nearby bookshop and admire some sculptures of a man and a woman who are hanging off the electricity wires above. The lady who checked us in at the hotel mentioned that we would see all sorts of art like these around the city, done by the local artist, David Cerny. Very cool.
We continue on for some ice-cream and we stumble upon the Franz Kafka rotating head sculpture. This was also done by our mate David and is a giant metallic head that rotates every 15 minutes. We happen to be there at the right time to see it. Very cool.
It's time to collect a Czech chip for our collection, so off to the casino we go. We go through the usual rigmarole of signing in and paying a fee and find out that Prague has banned pokies. No problem for us as we're here to lose our money at blackjack but that's a bold move for Prague. How does the casino make their money now?!
We only lose a little bit of money at a table with a bunch of American college students and grads on their summer vacay. We pocket our chip and start to wander back. We head across on the famous King Charles Bridge this time. It's crammed with people but the view is spectacular. We slowly wander back to the hotel, thoroughly enamoured by this beautiful city.
