Had a dream on Tuesday, decided on Wednesday, booked on Thursday, packed on Friday, and flew over on Saturday. I was here last so long ago it basically doesn’t count anymore. Because, who cares what happened in the last century anyways. The following 80 hours in Prague just gave me an introduction to this beautiful city in the midst of golden autumn colours.
Saturday
The airport in Helsinki even graciously invited me to leave my hand luggage in their care without any added charge because to flight was full. The Finnair flights were perfect because it landed in Prague already before 11 in the morning. That left me with most of the day to explore the city. The easiest way to get from the Prague airport to the city was taking the 119 bus and then switching to the green metro line to Můstek. Arriving to the old town welcomed me with a light rain. Luckily, I had come prepared, and it was no trouble to walk the slippery stone streets towards the hotel Cloister Inn. The room was not ready yet because I had come before check-in time. So, I picked up some things from the bags, left them in the hotel luggage room and hit the streets again. I had my first tour booked for 2 PM. I had just enough time to grab a lunch in an Irish pub that was on the way and reach the tour without being late. Getting over the river via Charles bridge was a challenge. It was so full of people. Charles Bridge is the most famous medieval stone arch bridge that crosses the Vltava River in Prague. So, it’s a must. Getting over it I finally did. I was looking for Jolana from an Airbnb Experience called “Experience Prague as a Local”. She was on time as well as two other quests. Great tour.
It took us through side streets to see some beautiful and interesting sights unknown to most tourists in Lesser Town, Old Town, and Hradčany. In three hours, this was a great introduction to the city I was going to spend the next few days in. The tour ended not far from my hotel, so the next order of business was to go and check-in, shower and find some food. I decided to use Bolt Food app and let them to deliver the food while I settled in. The Indian dish arrived just as I was ready for it and tasted delicious. The sun had set, and it was time to hit the streets again to find some of the sights for the Signal festival. The Signal festival is basically a festival of installations of light made by different artists and is scattered around the whole city. It took place only for a few days until the end of the week, so I had still two evenings to find them using the special app. I managed to find only one (of the “burning cars” delivered there from Ukraine) before it was time to meet with my next tour. I had managed to book a Prague Pub Crawl while waiting for the boarding to begin in the toilet of Helsinki airport. I have done it several other cities around the world before, but I had never seen such a big crowd of people. The point is usually to go through some 4-5 bars in one evening, have some drinks and then end up to some nightclub or something. For me it has always been a way to check out the local bar scene and watching people. In this case they took us first to a bar with open bar (with endless amount of beer, wine, vodka and absinth shots etc.) for two hours. I don’t know if anyone came out of this ordeal alive because I got bored in about an hour and took off by myself. As one cluster of the light installations were in the old town then finding them was easy. But as it was Saturday night then the streets were full of people. After walking around the town for two hours I got tired and went back to the hotel. It was time to call it a night.
Sunday
Breakfast in the hotel. First tour at 10 AM. Again, on the other side of the river. But this time it was different. The crowd was not there yet. It seems that thanks to some movie popular in Korea that was shot in Prague, I saw two Korean wedding couples photographing themselves on the Charles Bridge. Good for them. And for Prague.
The tour included a walk through the streets around the river, we (me and a couple from US) saw a Maltese church, the Lennon wall, some really strange crawling babies with barcodes on their faces and heard a story about each and every sculpture on the Charles bridge (there are like 30 of these). This was the longest 45 minutes of any tour I have been on. The guy couldn’t really manage a group, even the three of us. But it got better. The second half of the tour took place in a boat on the river Vltava. It was a small boat, but it became handy because it allowed it to get into some small side channels that the bigger boats on the river can’t. Included was a drink (coffee, water or beer) and an ice cream. I always try to take river cruises wherever there is a river running through the city. It just gives another perspective of the destination.
For lunch I looked up one of the Czech food joints the guide from day before recommended. It is basically an eatery for locals. It was packed full but somehow the system worked fluently. It was like an automated belt in a big factory. I had some traditional potato pancakes with spinach and beef stew. And a large dark lager of course. Still my mouth is watering when I think back to that. In the afternoon I went to hunt me some sculptures and architectural pearls around the city. There is the Sigmund Freud hanging from a post, a couple flying with their umbrellas over the street and the statue of king Wenceslas riding an upside-down dead horse. It was like a treasure hunt, and I found them all. The next order of business was to take the tram to the most hideous TV tower of Prague. It is called the Žižkov Television Tower and it was built in the end of the 80s. What makes it interesting is that there are also a bunch of crawling babies climbing the tower. Yes, the same artist as before. I planned also to see the view from the top, but their card payment terminal wasn’t working, and they were “sorry for the inconvenience”. So was I but as I still hadn’t touched a single coin of the local currency then it couldn’t be helped. The original plan had been to take a walking food tour on Sunday afternoon. But that got cancelled just an hour after booking. Allegedly because the guide had fallen ill. I hope it wasn’t food poisoning.
So, I took another tram to the other side of the river again. The public transport system works really well here. I used the Moovit app for the recommended routes and I had bought the 72 hours (3 days) ticket from the airport bus stop, which works in buses, trams and metro alike. The tram took me to the base of the hill called Petrin. The plan was to take the funicular up the hill and see the sunset from there. The golden hour in October starts around 5PM when the sun still shines over the hills on the old town. But the funicular wasn’t working for the random two weeks period in the middle of the month. I didn’t feel like climbing anymore so I just walked back over the bridge. In the middle of the bridge there is an elevator and some stairs to take you down on a small island in the middle of the river. It’s a really popular small park to walk, sit and watch the boats go by. That’s what I did as well and saw the golden hour from there. I also got the notice from Airbnb that the tour I had planned to take on Monday got cancelled because part of the National Park wasn’t still open after a fire that took place there. The guide offered to go for an unofficial tour anyway, but I respectfully declined.
There was just enough daylight left to walk to the next bridge – the Jiraskuv Most – and see the so-called Dancing House. Building gained its name thanks to the towers that resemble famous figures of dancers, Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. The house was built due to the long series of incredible and unexpected coincidences in 1996 and is architecturally an interesting peace of art.
Back in the hotel I made a new booking for another nature tour for the next morning and saved the day that way. For dinner I opted for some Asian dish with a funny name – Bibimbap. I’m sure it means something to someone. For me it was a delicious meal delivered by Bolt Food again to my hotel. After dinner I headed out again. It was the last night of the Signal festival, and I hadn’t seen the main attraction yet. It was located in another district of Prague. So, I took a tram and soon saw the crowds gathered in front of the church of St. Ludmila. The church was used as a canvas for the laser projections. It was about 10 minutes long program and started again after about 5 minutes break. I watched through it twice before walking towards the next installation in the same neighborhood.
Getting back from there proved to be a harder task than I had anticipated. The trams were so full of people that the doors didn’t want to close. So, I decided to use the Bolt scooter instead. It wasn’t a good choice. Not because of the scooter, which was great as always, but because the roads not meant for this kind of a ride. Another thing that proved to be difficult was to find the little parking areas where I could end my ride. It took me three tries to finally find a place that allowed me to leave the bike there. Luckily, I had managed to move forward for two tram stops and I could finally get into one. It was time to call it a night.
Monday
Time to get out of Prague and see some nature and countryside. The Airbnb Experiences guide Jan did hotel pick-ups. Good thing because that’s how I had time for breakfast. There were 6 of us on the tour. One couple from UK, a mother and daughter from Canada and another guy whom I had already met on the first day here as we were then on the same tour as well. It took us 1,5 hours to get to the Bohemian Paradise nature reserve north-east from Prague called Prachovské skály (The Prachov Rocks). It is a hilly area, which is the heart of a UNESCO Geopark. The hills have been formed long time ago thanks to the volcanic activity in the region and are primarily made of sandstone. Several of the individual rock towers have inspired names due to their appearance, such as the Leaning Tower, Devil’s Kitchen, the Monk, the Elephant, and the Eagle.
It was a beautiful day. One of the finest this fall if the locals are to be believed. The morning started a little foggy, but it cleared up during the day. We reached the beginning of the trail and there were already some people there before us. The rock formations there were something I have never seen anywhere else. They looked really majestic with the first rays of the morning sun touching their crowns. We followed the trail, taking necessary stops in the middle of the climb and marveled the views. There were man made steps and each one of them was different size and height. It takes really a lot of work to make them all so different from the next one. We met several others on the trail. Some of them even several times. We even saw the other guide with the group I was supposed to be part of originally. They looked really tired and unhappy compared to our happy bunch. Universe does work in mysterious ways sometimes. The trail made a nice loop and took us back to the beginning. Just in time for lunch. For that we needed to take a little drive to a nearby castle turned into a hotel and restaurant. The menu consisted of real Czech cuisine samples and was a little too large portion even for me. After lunch we had a chance to explore the castle a little bit and enjoy the views from the top of the bell tower. On top of the tower, we were also offered a shot of locally made moonshine (slivovitz) made of plums. After that it was important to get down from the winding stairs before the drink reached your head.
The third and final stop of the tour were on the way back in an old monastery where the monks had been brewing beer for centuries. The man-made cavern under the monastery served as a large drinking hall offering different types of local beer. After enjoying all there was to enjoy, we had to embark on the return journey back to Prague reaching there just before 5 PM. After a long shower and a tasty Beef Kung-Pao later it was time to hit the streets of Prague again. The night was still nice and warm. It felt like time to visit the Prague Castle. There are two or more options to get to the castle on top of the hill. Most of them require climbing up some stairs. I took the only option that didn’t require climbing. There is a tram that takes you up there near the back gate. There were almost no one up there. During the day it was pretty crowded, but in the night, it felt like magic. Kind of. Walking through the courtyards and staring up to the illuminated towers and buildings. Nice. And it was even nicer to walk down the hill afterwards.
Back in the old town, I went to search for some jazz clubs. The one I found just had a live band starting to play. The place was packed but I stayed there for a while to enjoy a beer and some music. The streets were still full of people. Even it was Monday night. Walking in Prague in the dark feels very safe and I encountered no problems. After a while my legs reminded me that I had already been on a long hike. So, I allowed them to take me back to the hotel for the last night in Prague.
Tuesday
The morning was very foggy, and I didn’t have the foggiest idea what to do with my last day here. The weather forecast promised some heavy rain in the afternoon. So, I decided to have a strong breakfast, pack my bags and check-out as early as possible. I left my bags in the luggage room again and went for a walk. The Petrin hill still annoyed me. It was a place that had defeated me already once. So, I decided to ignore the fog and go up there. Thanks to the guide from the day before, I now knew that there was another way in. First to take a tram up the hill and then walk through the monastery grounds to the Petrin tower. It was quite easy to find actually. Even when you couldn’t see much of the tower through the fog. But that also helped to make a clear choice not to climb up the tower as well. I walked down instead grinning from left to right. It was really steep climb, and I was happy that I chose not to come this way. There were so many on the way that did just that.
You remember the crawling babies? The same artist is also responsible for a Pissing sculpture in the courtyard of Franz Kafka Museum. It was really cool. After that I decided to visit some pop culture as well and headed to the biggest department store in the area. It turned out to be pretty boring. All the same stores and brands as back home. Then I went through some design stores that Google new about. Even more boring. There was absolutely nothing that caught my eye. Then it felt already like lunchtime. There were some recommendations from local guides where to go and what to eat. They were apparently good choices because they were all full of people. I didn’t feel like staying, so I finally ended up to a vegan buffet in some random small department store.
It was nearly time to leave for the airport. Five stops with metro and 8 stops with the bus and here I was. Back in the Vaclav Havel Airport.
It started to rain.
The full video is available here:
jatravellingxp.com 