wonderful trip to Prague

Vladislav Hall in Prague Castle


This is one of the numerous towers around the city of Prague


Here is the Charles Bridge, built in 1357 by Charles I, for a very long time the only bridge across the Vlatava River.



Some of the really interesting early 20th century buildings on Wenceslaus Square, and throughout the city.

The New-Old Synagogue, dating from 1270

We had a really nice few days in Prague. What an interesting city! It has a much more lively and younger vibe than Vienna, and even thought everyone told us it was really quiet (not yet tourist season) it certainly felt crowded and busy to us.

We arrived on Thursday afternoon and went to our hotel whose name we got from one of our tour books. Sounded good, but it turned out to be a bit far from the center of things, so we stayed there one night and then changed to a wonderful art nouveau building on Wenceslaus Square for the other nights.

Spent lots of time walking around this city. It is built along a bend in the Vlatava River and the oldest section is cramped into that area. Although much has been rebuilt in the early 20th century, the Old Town section is full of tiny, windy streets with no right angles anywhere. I have never been so lost in my life! (and I consider myself a good navigator- so much for that!)

There is a large open square in the middle of the Old Town which is a great city space, lined with restaurants and bars and lots of people everywhere. The old town hall has a tall tower that one can ascend to see the city below, and a neat astrological clock that is a major tourist draw. On Saturday an Easter market opened in this square, full of little booths selling traditional food and goods.

The architecture everywhere is phenomenal! Really unusual art nouveau every place you look. I am making an album of them all for those who are interested. So many painted buildings or others with mosaics embedded on the facades. And all intersperced with overblown Baroque beauties and tall medieval towers! And yes, interesting new architecture also.

We took a long tour of the Jewish quarter on Friday that was quite extraordinary. The Jewish ghetto was in one of the oldest sections and much had been torn down and rebuilt around the beginning to the 20th century, so there are not many of the original buildings extant, except for several of the synagogues and the cemetery. But they were quite fascinating and suggestive in themselves. Only a couple are still in use for religious purposes- one is a Holocaust memorial and several have historical displays. The current Jewish community owns lots of artifacts collected from synagogues throughout the country when they were closed or destroyed by the Nazis. The Nazis had collected all the silver, Torahs, textiles, and other things and catalogued them all very carefully since they were planning to create a museum of an extinct race! Pretty scary stuff!

One of the most affecting displays was the original art created by children held in Theresenstadt concentration camp. There were also some pictures of the individuals and some artifacts, such as suitcases marked with their transit numbers. It made this history very real. Some of the kids were very young, and others were older and very good artists. There was one picture of the moon created by one of the teenagers that was taken on the space craft to the moon by one of the astronauts.

The other really impressive thing to see in this town is the castle- really a cathedral and royal palace and administrative center and residential area perched on a hill overlooking and across the river from the old town. We had to go two different days because Prince Charles was there the first day so some of it was off limits to peasants like us. (These royals can be so annoying!)
But the royal palace was very interesting- actually much of it a medieval building with later additions. The main room was a long open hall that was used as a throne room, a place of celebration and jousts, and sometimes a marketplace. (For my architectural colleagues, the ceiling was the biggest open space of the time, with vaulting that was designed by someone named Bernard Reid from Italy and it showed a transition from Gothic to early Renaissance, with spiraling vaulting shown in the photo at top of page)

And the really exciting thing was seeing the window from which the Defenestration of Prague took place! It was quite high up, and these poor folks were also shot at, after they landed in the dung pile! What ignominity! For those who are not aware- this was credited as the event that launched the Thirty Years War! Concilliators from the Hapsburg Court had come to Prague to try to convince the Protestants to return to Catholicism but obviously they were not successful!

After the major castle tour, we stopped to the the Lobkowitz Palace which was part of the royal ensemble. It is actually a separate building constructed within the castle walls that was and is still owned by a private family who was one of the richest in Bavaria and Moravia. They had been major players in the history of this country and were related to many royal families throughout Europe, and accumulated great wealth and property over many years. This property had been confiscated by the Nazis because the owner at that time was married to an Englishwoman and had been outspoken in his opposition to the Nazis. After the war, the family got it back for a short time, but then it was confiscated again by the Communists. So it was just after the establishment of the Czech Republic that they got it all back again! And amazingly, they got everything back!

In addition to their many properties, the family has an absolutely amazing collection of art and artifacts, including a very famous Bruegel painting, and the original manuscripts of the 3rd, the 5th and the 6th Symphonies of Beethoven because the scion of the family was his major patron as well as Mozart's reworking of the Messiah. Very cool!

And our big evening entertainment was a marionnette show of Don Giovanni! Now is that classy or what!

As for food, lots of meat in this town and they are not so interested in vegetables. Although I think there are more Italian restaurants than in Italy! Everywhere- so that one can get food other than traditional Czech if one is so inclined. In additon to beer and wursts, the food specialty is various pork things, duck over cabbage with dumplings, and a stewed beef served with cream and cranberries on top. All very heavy and served with fairly plain dumplings which are there to basically sop up the thick sauces. But mostly Rich enjoyed trying them out! But the thing that made me happy was that they like their coffee hot- as opposed to the Viennese, who seem to like it luke-warm!