Perfect Prague

 First, some promised shots from around the apartment... hotel room ;), where we retired for an afternoon respite after a very full day.

The view from one of our 7 windows 

Our Shanghai table (I won - again :)

Lazing around the living room - loving the windows!

Dana shows off the tv we've yet to turn on :)

From near the top of the staircase

Daniel was happy to pose in the various rooms while sipping his Coke from the "executive lounge"

and various bathtubs ;)

perhaps my favorite spot - the desk at the top of the stairs

Daniel is pointing to the window, I think?

Though the window between bathroom and bedroom intrigues just us as much

We opted to start our first full day in Prague as anyone should, with a walking tour.  The walking tour we chose is given by freelancers.  If you love the tour, you tip them.  No initial ticket purchase is necessary.  The company they work for also had other tours, which do have a fee (we're taking the Prague Castle tour at 11:00 a.m. today), so they use these free tours as a way to warmly welcome people to the city, a sort of hospitable loss leader, if you will.  Dana had read about a few particular tour guides who were exceptionally good, so when our group of 20 or so wound up with "Czech Dave" (to distinguish him from "Colorado Dave"), Dana was thrilled.  Within the first 20 minutes of the 2 1/2 hour tour, we all were in agreement.  We won the tour guide jackpot! :)

"Czech Dave" gets us situated for our tour - with a beautiful backdrop

Dave grew up in Prague, quite close to the Old Town center where our tour started.  He moved to the US in order to learn English, earned his degrees (a BA in Communications and a Masters in Counseling), lived in several states (including Ohio and California), before moving back to Prague about a decade or so ago.  At first he taught English, but, ultimately, he determined that he enjoyed being a tour guide most of all - meeting people from all over the world (our group alone consisted of tourists from Israel, England, Scotland, Australia, Colombia, the Phillipines, Germany, and, of course, we represented the good old USA) and getting to share with them his love for Prague.  A teacher at heart, he taught us all sorts of wonderful lessons as we walked through the streets of Old Town, New Town, and the Jewish Quarter, from how to say Cheers in Czech (Na zdravi!) to the three most important Czech individuals (Huss, Kafka, and Dvorak) to the reason the Czech nation so values its beer (Dana reluctantly gave in and had a beer, which he tolerated, with lunch ;) - Czechoslavika is responsible for the amber color we all have come to know so well.

 

The tour was educational and entertaining, and left us just outside the Powder Tower (a former home of much artillery back when the Old Town was walled off from everything outside of Prague), and next to a beautiful art noveau building where we had a late lunch.  The square is renowned for having four types of architecture represented at each corner - art noveau, gothic, baroque and functional

 

 you sort of get the idea ;)


After lunch, we went back to the Stavovske Diavadlo, or Estates Theater, to buy tickets for tonight's premiere performance of Don Giovanni.  Built in 1783, and the only wooden opera house to remain standing from that time period, this is the very theater where Mozart himself first conducted the opera, and where Amadeus was filmed.  We figured it would be a pretty good place for the four of us to dive in to our first ever opera!

The famed ghost from Don Giovanni

We will be in box 7 at 8:00 pm tonight :)

Now it was time to stop by the pharmacy to get Dana some saline solution, which led us into the most fascinating/confusing mall we would have never encountered (though it was just a block from our hotel, we wouldn't have likely entered a "galleria" when there was so much wonderful history to explore at our doorstep) had we not been sent there on a specific errand, through a wonderful little market on the streets leading back to our hotel, to finally sample the famed trdelnik and then back to our hotel for the aforementioned respite.

love that their bookstores are called "palace of books" :)

Yum! We're fans :)

After our siesta, we were back out to wander the streets at night, for a delicious Italian dinner that is considered a favorite among the residents here (it's delightful to hear nothing but Czech spoken at every table around you; after all, residents don't want to eat Czech food every night any more than we do!) and then back home for that somewhat competitive (at least among the girls! ;) card game.

Now it's time to head out for the Castle tour, exploration of the other side of the river, and the famed Charles Bridge.  Tomorrow, we head off to Salzburg around 11:00 a.m, but before we leave I will try to write a quick blog entry about our experience at the opera tonight.   Until then...