Well, we are off to a great start today. Right now we are in a bright yellow "Student Agency" bus heading to Praha. This is the bus of my dreams; the bus I wished we had in Turkey, Greece, Albania, Montenegro, Croatia, Bosnia... new, comfortable recliner seats with legroom, snacks, movies, music, a nice hostess serving drinks, A/C and free WiFi! This is as nice as most trains and jets (but no bathroom). Why oh why do we get this now on a three hour trip, instead of the ten hour overnight in Turkey, or the ten hour Bosnia to Zagreb trip? Well, this will be a fond memory.
I am having positive thoughts about Prague...
We arrive exactly on time, the metro is just right there, about fifty cents a ticket, three stops later we are off, two blocks, around a corner and we are there. Our room is small, but well laid out, we look out directly on a church and square, a bottle of sauvignon blanc wine is chilling on ice (welcome gift), the hotel has every amenity we could need for the next four days... this is looking good!
So we are in Prague. Praha.
The receptionist is giving us our room key-card and is pulling out the tourist restaurant reviews when I ask, where does she like to eat? Her eyes light up, she grabs a map and pen, and tells us about three of her favorite hangouts, then says, "…and over here on the right corner, 20 metres is the local bar. Very good, what we eat." OK. Now we are talking.
So we out, right, and at the corner is… well, three bars. Which is the local one?
I look around, then look up and sure enough, it is “Lokal Bar.” The menu is in Czech, everybody speaks Czech, we smile a lot and say "pivo." Pivo is beer.
We order up two beers (On the tab, we have the "5" size which is half litre, or large, and he has crossed off two mugs. Here is what is funny to me: we COULD order 90 beers total on this tab!). Urquell Pilsner, the most famous (and pretty decent) Czech beer.
Cost at Lokal for a half litre of beer? 22 krowns, or $1
I love Prague already.
I end up lucking into some spicy sausages with fresh ground horseradish and mustard, Gail gets a chicken salad. Both are perfect.
As for the beer. Perfect complement to the sausages, good taste, easy drinking, probably ahead of the Budvar but I need a second taste at that Eggenberg. Really good though; Urquell.
We stop by St. Jacob's church to see a blackened, gnarly hand hanging from the wall. Some guy stole money that was the offering to Mary, so they cut his hand off and hung it up. In 1700. A blackened, shriveled 300 year old hand.
It makes the point.
We find our way into the main square and I am just astounded. It's huge, surrounded by fantastic buildings and churches; a parade of music groups from all over Europe are lined up, wearing traditional dress, as the first group in line performs.
We wade through the crowds towards the astrological clock, which just happens to start up. We get to see death chime the bell, but miss the rest. A trumpet player bugles a mournful tune twice, once out of the front of the tower, once from the back. It is eerie how this all reminds me of Krakow. We walk through streets just looking around, and end up down at the Vltava River, where we see the castle across the water, the Charles Bridge, other buildings and bridges. We get on the Charles Bridge, and it is really crowded, lined with artists, vendors and crowds of people. Above us all tower the statues lining the bridge, at both ends are magnificent buildings, domes, spires and towers. As we walk under the curved gate in the tower on the castle end, trumpeters are playing. It feels like they are welcoming you to another land, like we are the returning king and queen entering the city.
It starts to sprinkle so we hustle off the bridge, then it is full-out raining. We stop at Café Kafka for water, then grab a bottle of red Czech wine at the store and go hide out in the room for an hour.
The rain stops, so we duck out, around behind the church that is in front of our hotel, over to Restaurant U Červeného Kola (Red Wheel) which was recommended to us by our trusty receptionist, Andrea. We'll see how she does with this one. They serve traditional Czech food, and we are not even close to any kind of tourist traffic. The prices are more than reasonable. So I order traditional crispy-skinned roasted duck with red cabbage, homemade potato pancakes and dumplings. (Duck here is about the cheapest meat available, believe it or not.) It comes out and it is a whole duck, and it is tremendous.
Gail has her usual mozzarella, tomato and basil, and she says it is perfect. Red Italian wine, white Czech wine, Mattoni sparkling water finish off the meal. While we are drinking, waiting for the food, I have fun reading some of the unique foods they have here: Rosamary, papper sauce, sherry tomatoes, blue chees, gratinated goat cheese, cramberries. It is like this all over Europe, makes for entertaining reading. After our great dinner, we decide to have dessert, hot raspberries with ice cream and a sprig of mint. Oh my.
As we talk with our waiter (who is from Slovakia) he insists we have an icy cold shot of Becherovka, a traditional liquor with 40 herbs. The locals call it “medicine” and it is recommended you drink a shot a day, to help you sleep and keep you healthy. Well, OK then, I was just going to try it because it is traditional, like ouzo in Greece, or Raki in Albania. The difference is: this stuff is good! Really a complex mix of tastes. I am tempted to have a few more shots to try to discern the herbs, but I do need to find my way back the 30 meters to our hotel, and I would like to wake up without a headache, so we pay the bill and leave.
Prague is a great place.