Prague.

Nancy was such a liar.

Prague was fabulous.

AND cheap.

There's a reason this post is simply named Prague.  'nuff said.

This city, I opted to get a hostel.  I'd thoroughly enjoyed couch surfing, but I needed a break.  I needed one city where I could come and go whenever I wanted, go to bed whenever I wanted, and just generally be alone for a bit.  Yes i'm traveling alone, but besides the trains, I'm never really alone.  I'm always accountable to someone or obligated to be somewhere at a certain time. 

Besides. Prague was dirt cheap.  Three nights for thirty USD? That's cheap even by hostel standards, and Sir Toby's hostel was one of my favorite hostels so far.  Six bed female with our own bathroom and showers.  Plus there was a patio garden and a bar/restaurant/kitchen in the basement.  I found it by the recommendation of the young German guy from the couch surfing meeting.

Upon my arrival I bought a three day public transpiration pass for 310 Czech Koruny (20 Koruny equals 1$).  Meaning I could take any bus, tram, or metro.  Quite the bargain compared to, well, anywhere.  In London, 12£ would buy me just a day pass for the tube (maybe the buses too I'm not sure).

The hostel was conveniently right next to a bus stop.  I arrived in the late afternoon, so I headed directly up to Prague castle, hoping it would be much less crowded at that hour. 

I wish I had more to say about Prague, but its main beauty is all in its architecture and layout I've the Vltava river.  It has to be seen in person.  Pictures don't quite capture it all. 

The castle was enormous with beautiful gothic gargoyles and arches.  Walking just around the castle gave a great view of the eastern bank of the city.  By the time I made my way down the hill it was quite dark.  I had no intention to learn my way around the city at that hour (as with directions I tend to learn through my numerous mistakes and miscalculations).  So I found a bus back to the hostel, and called it a night.

In the morning, I went directly to the old town center, aptly called the Old Town Square.  There was the national theater as well as the famous Prague Orloj.

The Orloj is an astronomical clock made in the 1400's.  It is the third oldest astronomical clock in existence and the only one that's still operational.  The main dial tells the current zodiac sign, and every hour there is a display of four figures.  The four figures were meant to represent what were considered the "evils"of the time.  The first figure is Vanity, a man looking at himself in the mirror.  The second figure is Greed, a Jew holding a bag of gold.  The third is Death, who chimes the bell on the hour.  The fourth is a Turk, representing pleasure and entertainment.

Tourists are known to lose their wallets one minute to the hour.

I took a very long walk south through the city along the Vltava river.  The bank is a very nice paved bike/pedestrian way that leads up yet another hill.  This gave a view of the west bank, including tiny Prague castle in the far distance.  At the summit there was also an old cemetery with several famous Czechs, none of whom I had heard of. 

I had to rush from this view a little as I had a Skype date.  This wasn't a habit of mine throughout the trip.  Not that I didn't want to keep up with friends and family, but between finding internet and finding appropriate times when your six hours away, its a pain, and I don't want to spend my limited time here talking to a monitor.  However, life was still happening in Ohio, and I had roommate and living situations to take care of.

After a productive chat, I took a bus half way up the old town to an old church on the south bank of the river (if your wondering how the city has a bank in all four cardinal directions, the Vltava is L shaped).  There I had one ticket to see the Prague Symphony Orchestra.

I was the only patron under forty.

Not to mention the only one in jeans.

I have no idea what opera they performed, but it was entirely in German.  Which hopefully meant I want the only one that didn't understand what was going on.  The 15 person choir stood behind the orchestra, while one lady and two gentlemen stood up front, singing the main roles.

It was beautiful to hear, especially when the full choir joined in. The church had great acoustics.  I can appreciate classical music, definitely, but it had been a long, long day by that point.

45 minutes in, I simply could not keep my eyes open.  I felt terribly rude, but I was not the only one judging by the bobbing heads in front of me.

I left at the intermission, not wanting to be a bad audience.  In my defense I didn't leave to go party, I really went back to the hostel and directly to bed.

The next day I took a bus to the south end of the city and started to work my way up from there.

I visited the botanical gardens first.  I've never had much luck with plants myself, but I've always had a thing for greenhouses.  This one had ponds, streams, and a full aviary arsenal of exotic parrots.  On the other end they kept a greenhouse desert with cacti and the like.

I crossed the Vltava and made my way up to the thing I'd been saving for last.

The Lennon wall.

The small bit of wall had started out on the late 80's as a place where students would write about social and political complaints (it was under communist rule at the time).  It led to quite the feud between the youth and the police.  Even when authorities would repaint the wall, the next day it would be chock full of poems, flowers, and peace signs.  The movement was labeled Lennonism (an ironic twist on leninism).  Apparently there was once a portrait of him on the wall, and there probably is again every few weeks, but the wall is constantly changing.  Even while I was there, I saw several people with paint markers (all I had was my measly marker).

Mostly written were Beatles/Lennon lyrics, messages of love to John, messages of general peace and love, and of course the usual "we were here"stuff.

It was one of the most memorable things I've seen yet, and I wish I could visit it every week to see its metamorphosis.

When you exit the courtyard of the wall, you pass a particularly interesting fence along the same theme.  Couples in love
write their names or initials on padlocks and clip them to the fence to remain there for, well, they hope for forever.  I've heard of this being done before, especially on bridges.  Many times authorities will cut the locks off, once again to find the fences dripping with locks just days later.  I thought it was beautiful.  And really, you can't run out of fence, because you can just clip one padlock onto another.  Very deep if you think about it symbolically.

I really felt lighter the rest of the day.

Which was good, because I had a mission.

Shoes.

It was time to finally day farewell to my trusty boots that had done me so well (until the Venice Flood of O-twelve).  So I headed to to enormous pedestrian shopping street, Na Prîkopê.  There you could find ANYTHING.  Most of the shops were a little more on the high end, but there were numerous shopping centers where you could find the typical mall-type stores.

You might think shoe shopping isn't such a big thing, but when you live on your feet, there are many variables to consider.  An uncomfortable shoe could cripple my trip, figuratively and literally. 

Despite the surmounting odds, I accomplished my mission in approximately three hours.

By that time it was nightfall again.

Prague is known for its stellar night life, but alone, I didn't care to check it out.  Its a general misunderstanding that a girl alone in a bar wants to be hit on.  Not always easily explainable in a second language either.

So I opted for a movie.

What I didn't think about, was how late the movie would let out.

Just past midnight, the regular bus schedule stops, and the less frequent night bus schedule starts. Meaning I had to wait forty minutes for the bus.

Now Prague was still very much alive in the area I was in, but I suspected it wasn't quite so busy in the region between where I was and where I wanted to go.  I could have made the walk in twenty minutes but opted not to.  Perhaps movies and television blow the situation out of proportion, but I've always associated the bad side of Prague with illegal sex industries. 

After spending half an hour next to a homeless man incessantly counting his change (there were other people around too), the bus finally arrived.

The next day meant Berlin, which meant more familiar faces.

Na Shledanou Prague
Tegs