Prague, Czech Republic

Sunshine, at long, long last. Two days of beautiful, clear, sunny skies and weather in the high seventies or low eighties. Perfect sightseeing weather. Our usual sightseeing habits prevailed and we ended up walking all over the city and seeing things somewhat at random. Prague seemed to both of us the first city we've seen that compared in beauty and style to Paris. There is a church at the top of the hill where the castle sits that could have been Notre Dame's little brother. The castle was really an entire town with a series of palaces sitting next to each other surrounding the big church. The palaces themselves were not ornate and looked more like mansions than the homes of royalty. But we saw numerous other buildings throughout the town that were ornate enough to make up the difference.

Churches, churches everywhere. Not only churches abound, but we also saw several synagogues, one of which was done up entirely in pastels on the outside. St. Mary's church is a stunning architectural feat with twin spires surrounded by capped turret-like things at uneven levels. You can click here to see somebody else's picture of it (someone with a much better camera than what we have). http://www.flickr.com/photos/30724898@N03/3262514997/

The first evening, we went back out on the prowl after walking the whole morning and most of the afternoon. We were in search of the restaurant Radost after Jess Stambaugh's recommendation. Amir wanted to check out the Sunday brunch menu for the next morning. Sadly, the cafe was closed and only a funky bar sporting young dreadlocked hipsters remained open. So we kept walking and hit up an Irish pub nearby that had three female patrons who were all watching and giggling over Norbit with Eddie Murphy, sadly dubbed in Czech.

The next day, Sunday, we hiked up a big hill across the bridge from the main part of town and joined a crowd of families and friends enjoying beers in plastic cups on picnic benches overlooking the best view ever of the city. Then we strolled back down the hill and across the bridge, stopped at a grocery store for supplies, and ended up having a picnic lunch under a shady tree in a square people-watching. Amir thinks that Eastern Europe boasts the scantiliest-clad women in the world which makes people-watching much more interesting. Put it this way, there was a girl at our hostel in Krakow we dubbed "Cheeksy" and not because of her face.

Later in the afternoon, we proceeded to get purposely lost, also on the advice of Jess Stambaugh. We wandered down twisty streets and tried to chose avenues that were less trafficked. So I think we managed to see quite a lot of the city in two days, which is good as today, the third day, it is rainy and we are planning to catch a train at noon bound for Cesky Krumlov near the southern border of the country. After that, we just might hop an overnight train back to Amsterdam to avoid expensive hostel costs and get more time in that lovely Vondelpark en route to Copenhagen, Denmark where we hope to meet up with Amir's college friend Peter.