To finish it up, I'll have to go from memory. These numbers may or may not necessarily be entirely accurate, but there's no one around to audit them or care, so here it is:
Last day in Prague
Number of.....
Famous bridges: 1 (St Charles - what a sight)
Churches: I lost count (at least 6)
Scoops of ice cream: 1
Successful trips to park and ride sans dad: 1
Sick dads: 1
Emails from work that were scary: 1 (thankfully fine now!)
Busy pedestrian streets: all of them
Exits from the tube that would have been better than the one we used: all of them
Surprisingly tasty street food: 1 (no idea what it was called, but pictured below)
Czech beer: 2
Times I missed seeing the show on the Glockenspiel type clock: 2
Missed sights at the Jewish quarter: all of them
Times I thought to myself about moving to Prague: 12
Times I then reminded myself of the language issue: 12
We started the day a bit late after indulging in the included breakfast, which included eggs of unidentifiable cooking and spam/bologna. It doesn't get much better than that folks - breakfast of champions. Dad ended up being sick this day, so mom and I were forced to navigate the streets of Prague together, which turned out fine. The park and ride was pretty empty and having done it the day before felt like we were cheating on our accomplishment. We went straight into the old town, where I proceeded to choose the absolute worst spot to exit from the tube. As we exited, we saw a great looking building that I thought had to be in the direction of the old town. Wrong....we walked a good KM out of the way to see what I believe was the natural history museum in the wrong direction. As we made our way to what I now knew was the direction of the old town, we found a much easier tube exit....such is life of traveling underground with no English signs.
We made our way first to the center square to take a gaze at Jan Hus again, who made reformation cool long before Martin Luther made it a movement. We then toured the 2 churches on the square, including Tyne church. Both were neat, but not nearly the sight as St Vitus at the castle from the day before. Seriously, that might be my favorite church in Europe (outside of St. Chappelle in Paris). We also tried some cinnamon roll thingy on a stick - soo good.
Since we were in the area, we hit a small courtyard recommended by RS for it's middle ages architecture. You know you are going old when the streets turn into cobblestone that you would expect inmates in a jail to have to walk on as torture. It was a gorgeous area and even though it was early, we decided to do a pizza lunch on the square, which was fantastic (along with a beer). After that, we headed to St Charles Bridge, which RS gave 3 pyramids. I have to agree. It was a great pedestrian stroll along the bridge, with artists, musicians and the like entertaining. I have to hand it to Prague - they had some of the best street performers I've seen in Europe. One guy did a show with water glasses like the talent from the film "Ms. Congeniality", which sounds cheesy, but it was incredible. I would seriously consider a CD of that - seems like perfect sleepy time sounds. We also did the ritual of touching an object means good luck or that you will come back to whatever city you are in....see picture below.
After that, it was churches and more churches. I really did lose count. We couldn't take pictures in all of them, which I'm not sure would have helped jog my memory on what we did and didn't see. So many churches....a guy from work in H-town told me I would get tired of European churches....I said that's not possible. It's like getting tired of Blue Bell - I just couldn't fathom it. Well, I can now fathom. SOO many churches.
We stopped for an RS recommended ice cream scoop and then walked to the Jewish quarter, where I found that most of the sights were closing early for a Jewish holiday the following day. I always keep a Jewish calendar handy.....can't believe I forgot it on this trip. It looked like a really neat area of town and definitely something to do on the return trip.
After that, we shopped a little bit (still hunting for some red shoes!) and made our way back to the park and ride, where we discovered that the restaurant at the hotel had decent food and cheap beer. Good combination.
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