This is the first of these blog things, which I’m writing on the train from Prague to Warsaw. It’s just past 11am and we’re sat in a 6 seat comfortable cabin with 2 Czech guys who are busily chatting to one another. You wouldn’t get that on the Reading to Paddington line!
We arrived in Prague on Saturday morning at 9am after getting a sleeper train from Frankfurt, which was an experience. A cosy little cabin where Pat had the lower bunk and I was on the top one – all mod cons, including secure doors and sinks we couldn’t figure out how to work easily! We were impressed! We pulled out of Frankfurt station, watching the night scenery before going to bed. At 5.50am an announcement was made letting us know that passport control was about to take place after the stop at Dresden, so we wearily got dressed. Ten minutes later there was a knock on the door and a German guard checked our passports. We went back to bed thinking that that was it, but were woken up by another German guard knocking followed ten minutes later by a Czech guard. I didn’t bother getting out of bed for those! Breakfast was served at 8am and we got off the train an hour or so later and I managed to persuade Pat to get the Metro rather than a taxi to the hotel!
The hotel was in the Pankrac district to the south of the train station and central area, just 10 minutes on the tube and short walk. We dropped our bags off there and headed on into the centre to do a spot of sight seeing in the Old Town area to the east of the River Vltava. What a lovely place - beautiful buildings everywhere you looked, but very touristy. We had lunch in a little café where I tried ‘stinky’ cheese, a local delicacy. Not bad – thought it had to be better than the ‘head’ cheese on offer. Pat had a cheese and ham toastie (unsurprisingly) and was disgusted to find ketchup in it! Got back to the hotel at 2pm to check-in, shower and have a snooze. That evening we went back into the centre for dinner and watched England lose against South Africa in the rugby world cup final. Boo.
On Sunday we had a lie-in and carried on our sight seeing to the west of the Vltava around the castle and cathedral. Again – lots of beautiful buildings and tourists! By fluke we got ourselves to the castle gates for 12am in time to see the changing of the guard ceremony which was amusing. The serious guards marched to a trumpet fanfair and tune not too dissimilar to the Thunderbirds theme tune! Guess you had to be there! Afterwards we hopped on a tram, just because, and went to try and get into the Jewish Cemetry but decided not to as we didn’t have enough cash and they weren’t accepting cards. Oh well. It started to hail so we decided to go to the City of Prague Museum, which we had the money for. We wandered around exhibitions of prehistoric man in Prague (not very unique) and city history upto the 19th century. There was one good exhibition with paintings of the city by 19th century artists. Before leaving we sat in the lobby and were earwigging a group of English girls who had just been looking at a model of the city. I was horrified to hear them trying to work out “Are we in Prague or the Czech Republic?” We left shortly after that, pretending not to be English.
Following a recommendation by Fatih, we had dinner in the Imperial Café. The previous night, we had walked to Garden in the Opera, another of Fatih’s favourites, but decided not to go in as it appeared v. posh and we turned up in combats and fleeces. Still, one out of two’s not bad! The café was lovely – great food and very pleasant décor and atmosphere. And I managed to get a traditional veggie Czech meal. We sat in the smoking section, so Pat was happy! He had a local speciality called Hulasky made from cabbage, bacon and sausages and I had dill soup with a poached egg and an Imperial hot chocolate with orange, which came with chopped up bananas. Yummy. I also asked for a serving of dumplings which the waiter was bemused by! How embarrassed was I! I had read about them being a traditional food and seen them on menus with meat, so was determined to get some. They went very well in the soup, by the way!
Afterwards, we went back to the hotel via a supermarket where we stocked up on snacks for today’s journey. I had trouble finding a small bottle of wine with a screw cap so made do with a bottle of fizz! Not bad eh. Spent the rest of the evening using the free internet access in the hotel and uploading photos from the past few days. Hope you’re enjoying those.
So this morning we were up early and left the hotel after breakfast. We sat in the central station waiting for the train and trying to use up as many Czech krona as possible, not wanting to add to the numerous GBP and euros still in our wallets. We’ve been on the train for just over two hours now with pleasant scenery of Czech countryside going by. That’s enough typing for now. Pat has returned from his cigarette quest and I need to find the loo after all that coffee in the station………
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