I hope everyone had an excellent Easter weekend! Laura and I spent easter in the Czech Republic. After we left the Derksens in Buren we spent a solid 2 days on several trains going across Germany, through Austria, and into the Czech Republic. Our first stop was Cesky Krumlov. It's another small midieval town with a 13th Century castle. It was quite cold out the day we spent there so we tried to make the best of it by staying indoors as much as possible. We took a tour through the castle (which was even colder inside), checked our emails and drank some warm tea in a Tea House in town. Our hostel here was the first one we've had that has a kitchen, so we were thrilled to pop a pizza in the oven our first night there. Laura
and I also discovered an english book store just down the street from our hostel. Since I finished the book I brought along in Austria already I was due for some new reading material. After Cesky Krumlov we stopped in Prague. I have heard so many good things about this city so I was pumped to get there. It was quite overwhelming to arrive at the train station there and be swarmed by crowds of people. But we managed to navigate our way around the station and through the city to our hostel, with very few signs in English to help us. Our hostel was pretty new, it had just opened the week before, which would explain the missing shower door, the blinds without a string to close them, and the bed rail pieces under my matress (which I didn't even notice were there until the second night..haha). It was a good hostel though, it was clean and there were always people buzzing in and out. We had 2 full days to wander through Prague and I think we were able to see all the main sights. Prague has a very recent history iwth communism and we stopped in their communism museum to check it out. It feels like this trip has been one big history lesson so far, I've been learning so many new things and am totally interested in reading further on some of this stuff when I get home. The museum was pretty interesting, they showed video clips of a riot that occurred in Prague in 1989. It occurred in Wenceslas Square where thousands of people gathered to protest the communist government, we happened to walk through this place on our way to the museum. The video showed people getting attacked by the soviet run police for protesting. This is something that has happened in my lifetime, most of the things we've been seeing are hundreds of years old, which makes it all the more interesting to read about. Now, in Wenceslas Square there are huge easter markets set up. They were selling everything from cheesy souveniers, food, paintings, to hand painted easter eggs. It was difficult to resist spending a lot of money here but I was able to limit myself to only a few things. I picked up a Czech patch to add to my collection, a small painting of the Charles Bridge in Prague, and a pair of earings & a ring that had an amber stone in them. The Cze
ch Republic doesn't use the Euro so we were using Koruny's ( I don't think that's spelt right) and the exachange in something wierd like 18 korunys to 1 cdn dollar. So it was tricky to know exactly how much I was spending, since my mental math is not so great! Either way things were a bit cheaper out here. They had a stage set up where Laura and I stopped to watch a group of kids dressed in traditional clothes singing and dancing. It was quite cute. We went on to the Old Town Hall to check out the Astonomical Clock. Tourists pack this area full every hour on the hour to watch the apostles float past the 2 little openings above the clock. This clock records three different kinds of time, Old Bohemian time, time as we know it today and so called Babylonian time. Thie clock also shows the movement of the sun & moon through the 12 signs of the zodiak, it's a very complex cloc
k! just down the road, and past a few more Easter market shops we walked up to the Charles Bridge. At any given time during the day this bridge is packed with tourists, artists drawing caricatures, vendors selling art and other souveniers, and musicians playing music. The bridge was built in 1357 so it's extremely old. Prague also has a castle that we climbed up a steep hill to see.
We didn't go inside the castle itself but it hada really nice Cathedral in the middle of its courtyard. The whole place was really crowded with tour groups so we didn't linger there for too long. Next we walked up Nerudova Street
. This street was interesting because before people used numbers to distinguish houses they had signs above the doors. There were things like a Swan, 3 Fiddles, two Suns, and a Shoe for the shoe makers house. Laura and I also found this building called the Ginger & Fred building. I'm not sure why it's called this but it was neat because it was had a different look to it. I'll let the picture show you what I mean. It was designed by a Fred Gahry. Overall Laura and I enjoyed Prague a lot, there was a lot of cool things to see but I think after a few days it's nice to get away from all the crowds of tourists ! After Prague we move up to Crakow, Poland !
and I also discovered an english book store just down the street from our hostel. Since I finished the book I brought along in Austria already I was due for some new reading material. After Cesky Krumlov we stopped in Prague. I have heard so many good things about this city so I was pumped to get there. It was quite overwhelming to arrive at the train station there and be swarmed by crowds of people. But we managed to navigate our way around the station and through the city to our hostel, with very few signs in English to help us. Our hostel was pretty new, it had just opened the week before, which would explain the missing shower door, the blinds without a string to close them, and the bed rail pieces under my matress (which I didn't even notice were there until the second night..haha). It was a good hostel though, it was clean and there were always people buzzing in and out. We had 2 full days to wander through Prague and I think we were able to see all the main sights. Prague has a very recent history iwth communism and we stopped in their communism museum to check it out. It feels like this trip has been one big history lesson so far, I've been learning so many new things and am totally interested in reading further on some of this stuff when I get home. The museum was pretty interesting, they showed video clips of a riot that occurred in Prague in 1989. It occurred in Wenceslas Square where thousands of people gathered to protest the communist government, we happened to walk through this place on our way to the museum. The video showed people getting attacked by the soviet run police for protesting. This is something that has happened in my lifetime, most of the things we've been seeing are hundreds of years old, which makes it all the more interesting to read about. Now, in Wenceslas Square there are huge easter markets set up. They were selling everything from cheesy souveniers, food, paintings, to hand painted easter eggs. It was difficult to resist spending a lot of money here but I was able to limit myself to only a few things. I picked up a Czech patch to add to my collection, a small painting of the Charles Bridge in Prague, and a pair of earings & a ring that had an amber stone in them. The Cze
ch Republic doesn't use the Euro so we were using Koruny's ( I don't think that's spelt right) and the exachange in something wierd like 18 korunys to 1 cdn dollar. So it was tricky to know exactly how much I was spending, since my mental math is not so great! Either way things were a bit cheaper out here. They had a stage set up where Laura and I stopped to watch a group of kids dressed in traditional clothes singing and dancing. It was quite cute. We went on to the Old Town Hall to check out the Astonomical Clock. Tourists pack this area full every hour on the hour to watch the apostles float past the 2 little openings above the clock. This clock records three different kinds of time, Old Bohemian time, time as we know it today and so called Babylonian time. Thie clock also shows the movement of the sun & moon through the 12 signs of the zodiak, it's a very complex cloc
k! just down the road, and past a few more Easter market shops we walked up to the Charles Bridge. At any given time during the day this bridge is packed with tourists, artists drawing caricatures, vendors selling art and other souveniers, and musicians playing music. The bridge was built in 1357 so it's extremely old. Prague also has a castle that we climbed up a steep hill to see. 
We didn't go inside the castle itself but it hada really nice Cathedral in the middle of its courtyard. The whole place was really crowded with tour groups so we didn't linger there for too long. Next we walked up Nerudova Street
. This street was interesting because before people used numbers to distinguish houses they had signs above the doors. There were things like a Swan, 3 Fiddles, two Suns, and a Shoe for the shoe makers house. Laura and I also found this building called the Ginger & Fred building. I'm not sure why it's called this but it was neat because it was had a different look to it. I'll let the picture show you what I mean. It was designed by a Fred Gahry. Overall Laura and I enjoyed Prague a lot, there was a lot of cool things to see but I think after a few days it's nice to get away from all the crowds of tourists ! After Prague we move up to Crakow, Poland !
1 comment:
Hi Christine,
Could Ginger & Fred refer to Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire???....dancers from way back...anyway cool building. Did you talk to any of the cute guys in your picture of the Astronomical clock? Did anyone speak English there?
Thanks for the update!
Love, MOM
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