Holiday in Praha

(Looking at Praha Castle from the center of town.)

Most of us grew up hearing and saying “Czechoslovakia” But in 1993 the Velvet Revolution allowed for the peaceful dissolution of this country into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. In effect, this returned them to an earlier set of independent countries.

In April, Toni and I went to Praha (how the Czechs spell Prague) for 3 days and what follows is my travelogue.


(One of the oldest buildings in Praha.)

The first mistake we made was to drive a car. When deciding how to get there I was told that it was only 6 hours away by car or 9 hours on the overnight train. But since I had the company pool car at my disposal, I saw this as a good way to go. Hey, we Americans always think of the car first. Well, living here as long as I have, I should have known that this was not the ideal way of getting to Praha. But I plotted the directions on Via Michelein.com, verified them w/ a local and off we went.

Well, we left an hour later than planned. Next, we stopped for gas and fluids which burned another 20 minutes. (BTW, it took $60.00 to fill up the Opel Omega. And I did this twice.) Once we made it out of Krakow we started to hit the construction sites. It was like driving on Highway 63 towards Hardy, Arkansas. You see, a lot of EU money is pouring into the new EU countries and Poland and the Czech Republic are major beneficiaries of it. So every few miles, or so it seemed, we had to slow down, or in two cases stop dead for 5 minutes. In one of those cases they were felling the trees that lined the two-lane country road which required them to stop the traffic as they yelled “timber” (or its equivalent in Czech). (On our trip home we counted 13 spots where we had to slow down for construction.)

After all of that we made it to the border crossing which looked like a highway toll station. We presented our passports, had them stamped, and on we went.


(A canal in Praha.)

The Czech countryside is full of pastures w/ small hills in the background. It seems like they grow lots of hay as the fields are full of haystack frames. As we traveled we continued to pass through construction zones that required us to reduce our speed from 150 to 60………kilometers per hour. That’s 99 miles per hour. Can you say zoom, zoom? And there were people passing me!!!!! There is a maximum speed limit in Poland of 130 K.P.H. but there did not seem to be one in the Czech Republic. But I can see the questions forming in your minds. No, I did not try to determine the top speed of the Opel as it was the company car after all. But the car handled really well. In fact, it seemed to hunker down and stick to the road at those speeds. (They do know how to build them over here. The Opel was originally a German built car but GM bought them a long time ago. The Omega is considered a large car here but it is a little smaller than a Ford Taurus.) But back to the drive. The highway to Praha was recently built and looked like it could have been lifted from any new interstate in the States. They seemed to be putting the finishing touches on it which caused the slowdowns. With all of that behind us we finally arrived at our hotel at 5:30 p.m., 9 hours after beginning. After checking in I went on a 45 minute hunt for a parking spot. After much frustration I found a garage under a department store and walked the 10 minutes back to the hotel. (Two days for $65.00. Ouch.)


(The Astonomical Clock. Over 500 years old but mostly rebuilt after WWII.)

After all of that we had a well-deserved drink while we planned our next day. Since we were using Rick Steves’ book Best of Eastern Europe 2006 we took him up on a tour company to use and booked the 8 a.m. Good Morning Praha tour. Although it was an early rise, the delight was that it was just Toni, Me and Ewa our guide. The added bonus was that the other tour groups were not out and about yet which made for a very quite and enjoyable morning. The tour consisted of the Jewish Quarter, a tram ride up to the Prague Castle, a kawa (coffee) in a local café, a walk across the Charles Bridge, several churches and numerous other sites. After almost 4 hours Ewa left us in the old town area which allowed us to go out on our own.


(Looking at Praha Castle from the Charles Bridge.)

Praha itself is a beautiful city founded in the 9th century which makes it older than Krakow. It is located in central Bohemia an area known for its lead crystal and art glass and has 1.2 million inhabitants. It does not have one main square like Krakow but has several distinct centers worth exploring. So that’s what we did. Six hours later we decided to café hop to try different Czech piva (beer). (There is some very good pilsner style beer here. And at 80 cents per half liter how can you have just one.) Sometime after 8 p.m. we went to an authentic Czech restaurant recommended by Rick Steves. It was housed in an old building outside of the main tourist zone and augmented by an old guitar player who was really good. After dinner we returned to our room tired and full of food and memories.


(In the Praha Castle courtyard. Fountain is over 500 years old.)

Overall, the trip was very good and Praha is a great city to visit. It owes its mystique to its history, the beauty of the buildings, the food and the beer. Although we would have liked an additional day in Praha, both Toni and I were looking forward to returning to Krakow, which to us is a better and more magical city.


(Brian as a work of art.)