30 miles

Whew. After the relaxing Rhine River cruise, we headed east on an overnight train to Prague, Czech Republic. The PM train was certainly anything but relaxing! Given the Holiday weekend, we could not reserve any sleeping berths. So, we toughed it out in second class, upright chairs. Yikes. All in all, it was ok - but not desirable. By the time we got to the Czech/German border, we were the only two left in our compartment and were able to put up the armrests and stretch out for a few hours before our arrival in Prague.

At 8am we started our whirlwind tour of old-town Prague. What a neat city! My impressions of Prague are these: (1) people really like their dogs -- they go everywhere with them AND are the most obedient dogs I have ever seen (for example, maybe five or six dogs are left outside a grocery store without being tied up and all sit patiently waiting for their owners -- without running away or even sniffing each other out), (2) the buildings all seem to have red roofs and etched stones for walls, which creates a striking effect, and (3) there is a definite separation between the oldtown (beautiful) and the suburbs (very stereotypically post-communist).

We started with a walk from the train station (one of the ugliest buildings I have been in -- imagine a seemingly short roof, DIRTY floors - gum, urine, spilled liquids, masses of people moving everywhere, smoky air, and many homeless and unstable folks milling about) to the National Museum (very nice) and then the Wenceslas statue. The walk from the train station to the town square was about 30 minutes. The entire promenade is full of shops, American and otherwise. While the shops flank the street, in the center, Czechs have set up little booths, generally selling some sort of meat. The promenade is quite wide - maybe the width of five streets? - and is mostly for foot traffic.

We proceeded to walk through the markets as they were being set up for the day's visitors and ended at Mosel, a famous crystal store. Apparently, the Czech Republic is well known for its fantastic crystal, garnets, and Moravian ceramics. We looked at but did not buy anything at Mosel. We stopped at the astronomical clock (one of the oldest in the world) and roamed through the town square. In the middle of the square, there were a number of trees decorated with Easter eggs, ribbons, and bows. It was quite festive! Following the crowds, we passed through the Jewish quarter where the oldest synagogue is. The synagogue was remarkable not only for its age (and small doors!) but also for the cemetery. People were buried up to 10 - 12 people deep there. All of the gravestones are haphazardly (seemingly) placed in the cemetery, on top of, in back of, next to -- any place were there was some semblance of room. Then, we crossed one of many bridges to walk to the Prague castle, the two main cathedrals, and the Charles Bridge.

On our way to the Castle, we happened upon a secluded garden between some of the old buildings. We roamed through the gardens and found a peacock couple. That is right -- just chilling in the garden for any old person to see -- two peacocks. On our way out of the garden, there was an old gazebo-sort of building which required much examination. What an interesting contrast to the US -- I cannot imagine a tourist town in the US having random peacocks and boarded up, mysterious gazeboes in quite the same fashion. Ahh, the wonderful experiences of travel!

As we had walked quite some distance by the time we got to the Cathedral (at the top of the hill), we thought it wise to climb the 300 stairs to the top of one of the spires. Real smart -- and again, we had our packs to carry as well. The Cathedral was packed by this time with tons of Spanish, Italian, and German tourists (and a few Americans sprinkled in here and there). The stairwell was barely wide enough for two people to fit and, of course, spiraled upwards. Given the degree of famishedness (is that a word?) that I felt at the time, I was the most claustrophobic I have ever been. Hundreds of people going up and down a narrow, steep, long staircase with no way to turn around, slow down, or catch someone if they fell -- we were like very stupid dominoes. But, the view at the top was more than worth it...

We literally walked for 12 hours, carrying our packs during the rainiest, windiest, coldest day since arriving in Europe. When the day had finally come to a close, we took the Metro (notably fast, efficient, and easy) to the suburb of Kacerov (pronounced "catcher-ah-v"). We were given limited instructions to our hotel, so wandered through the streets for 45 minutes. We stopped folks along the way -- most spoke very good English. While they all lived in the neighborhood, none had heard of the Kacerov Hotel or of Na'Uleihli Street -- this struck us as odd. It seems that in the states, you kind of know which streets are where and what establishments are located within five blocks of your home. We proceeded, however, hoping that we were in the right place!

We finally happened upon "Hotel Kacerov." After walking back and forth along Na'Uleihli street for ten minutes and keeping our eyes posted, Dustin found our new home. Located in a "cultural center," our place of residence for the next two evenings took half of a small strip mall. The Hotel comprised the first and second floors of one half; on the other half, the first floor was a grocery store and the second floor was "Club Kacer." Yep -- a dance club... Next door... Directly adjacent to our Hotel!

We checked in -- heck, we had already paid ($40/night - a relative steal in Prague on the holiday weekend). The room and hotel were so stereotypical, it was funny. We were exhausted, wet (but thankfully, not hungry), and really grateful for a warm bed. Having not slept well the night prior (the train ride), walked all day (we calculated approximately 30 miles), and being basically exhausted in all ways possible, we crashed at 7pm. Throughout the night, we were greeted with the bump-bump-de-bump of club music. Traveling didn't seem so great at 1am...