Post 2: Dresden and Prague Revisited

This is Dresden- old (rebuilt and restored) buildings galore

 So on the 27th we left Leipzig to go to Prague.  I figured instead of having a day of sitting on trains or busses it would be fun to take a few hours to see Dresden before continuing on to Prague.  It was nice to get a bit of a walk in, and Dresden is really pretty with all the old buildings.  A lot of the city burned during the fire bombings in WWII, but the alt Stadt (old city) has been pretty well restored, and some of it was spared from the fire.  I was surprised at how I remembered what many of the buildings were, since the last time I was there was 2008 with the Germs (as I call the group of our former German students).  We pretty much just walked around the old city, took lots of pictures of the old buildings, had lunch at an Irish pub, and then went to catch our train to Prague.

We arrived in Prague at about 6 pm and walked to the hotel we booked, but as it turned out there was something wrong with the room we had booked, so they upgraded us to a 4 star hotel up the street (closer to the old city).  We still paid the same price, but we had a really nice room, a big bathroom, and a pretty decent breakfast spread.  We were on the 4th floor, but even so the street noise was hard to sleep through; after about midnight people were going up and down the street drunk, or on their way to getting drunk, and then they'd all come back through at about 5am.  With all that noise, and the snoring from a certain family member I didn't get a lot of sleep in Prague!

The christmas tree and music stage in the old town square.

 After checking in we went out to explore a bit of the city at night and find something to eat.  The christmas market was still in full swing in the old town square, and they had a stage with live music plus loads of street food stands.  We got some Trdelnik, which is like a single layer cinnamon roll, to try, it was pretty tasty and also very tempting because anytime we walked by a stand we could smell it.  The street food stands are up year round in Prague, and I've heard that all their traditional specialties are quite good (potato pancakes- they smell super garlicy, fried bread that comes with different toppings are some of the others), but we only tried the Trdelnik.

We ended up going to the restaurant on the river where I went the last time I was in Prague (in early November).  This time our table wasn't next to the window, and we were seated in the warmest part of the upper deck, so I didn't have to wear my jacket this time.  We drank beer and ate some really great food- mom had an arugula salad (I'm not sure what all was in it, but it looked good) and rosemary-olive oil pizza bread (like a flat focaccia); dad had a salad with baked goat cheese (an entire round!), and some sort of risotto (I think I remember him saying it was the best he'd ever had); I had potato gnocchi in a garlic cream sauce with spinach and chicken, they were delicious little potato pillows- just like gnocchi should be!  Of course I also helped mom with the pizza bread and sampled dad's goat cheese.  After dinner we were feeling really full and in need of a walk before we went back to the hotel, so we crossed Charles Bridge and walked on the other side of the river for a bit before crossing back and heading to the hotel for a noisy night.

We spend the next day (the 28) wandering around Prague- seeing all the old buildings, admiring the views, we did a bit of shopping, took lots of pictures... typical tourist things!  For lunch we went to an Austrian restaurant under Charles Bridge, which is sort of funny since we didn't go to any Austrian restaurants when we were actually in Austria (besides Heurigen- but those aren't like the stereotypical Austrian restaurants with Wienerschnitzel and what have you).  After slowly making our way back to the old town square we decided to go have a siesta at our hotel before going out again.

Dad and mom by the modern art clock in the castle with the cathedral in the background.
My camera was doing a funny proportion distorting thing... but still a good picture.

One thing that I really noticed in walking around Prague with my parents was all the street musicians.  I don't know how, but they seem to be highly influenced by American blues and jazz musicians.  We heard one guy who sounded just like Lois Armstrong, there was another guy who sounded like an old guy from the middle of the Oasarks who had forgotten to put in his dentures, and a lot of well practiced musicians.  There was one guy in one of the bands who was playing a washboard and a cymbal with two whisks... he may have been my favorite.  All the band seemed to have a sign saying something to the effect that they play music inspired by the heart lands of America, or all the best classics.  If only the radio stations in Prague had stayed with those musical tastes... instead the rest of the city is immersed in terrible 80's and early 90's sappy bad pop music, which gets stuck in your head.

Street musicians on the Charles Bridge (can you see the whisks?)

When we went out again we headed down towards Wenceslas Square to see if they had some nice christmas decorations and shop displays.  As it turns out I like both ends of the square, but getting between them is a pain in the ass- there are so many people, and everyone is cutting across each other... not my favorite thing.  On the one side they had a small christmas market with some nice decorations and lots of food smells, and on the other is the statue of King Wenceslas and the National Museum.  The statue of the king was SURROUNDED by a sea of red candles and flowers in memory of Vaclav Havel. It was quite a sight to behold, and there were more people coming with candles and lighting ones that had gone out.

Memorial for Vaclav Havel around the statue of King Wenceslaus.

We continued our walk along the river to admire more of the city lights, we walked down to see the boats that cruise up and down the river all day and into the night, and then back to the same restaurant as the night before.  This time Dad and I both opted for pizzas and mom had the vegatable soup with bread.  My pizza had a spicy sauce and was topped with corn, salami and onions (plus I sprinkled some balsamic vinegar on- you all should really try that, it really brings out more flavors in the pizza); dad's pizza had anchovies and I can't remember what else on it...  Anyway, we were all three very happy with our dinners, although we were a little bit colder than the night before (thankfully there were blankets on the chairs for our use).  On our walk back to the hotel we were finally able to catch the astronomical clock on the hour (we always seemed to just miss it), and there was a Czech band playing some Irish sounding music in the square.

We left Prague on the morning of the 29 to take a bus to Vienna, but we had one last thing to do before we left the city.  I had asked mom to bring a copy of the Community Spirit (the newspaper of the Amherst  area in Wisconsin) with so that we could take pictures with it during our travels and possibly put one or two in the paper.  We forgot about it in Germany, and we also forgot to take it with us in Prague, so on our way to the bus station we stopped by one of the pretty old buildings (I think it's the town hall- or some sort of government building... I'm not entirely sure) and took a few pictures with the Spirit.  We didn't realize it then, but that was the beginning of our adventures with Connie Pitt (the poor unsuspecting elderly woman on the front page of this particular issue).

Anyway- more on Connie's trip to Europe in the next installment: Hiking and wine drinking in Austria!