Adventures in Foreign Lands

Today was quite interesting, as we decided to spend our last moments in Prague venturing off to a ghost town (literally, pics below) to see a church made from human bones. A little morbid, definitely creeping, but pretty amazing all the same. We received the recommendation from lovely Daphne, our palace tour guide. So after finally figuring out which train to take and what station to leave from (way more difficult than we imagined since no one at the train stations speak English), we were on our way to Kutna Hora.

This little town was about an our outside of Prague and it's major tourist destination is the so-called 'Bone Church,' which should tell you a good deal about the town. The church, actually called the Ossuary at Kostnice , was comprised of a cemetery and little bone church, where evidently there are the remains of about 40,000 bodies (most used for the church decor not buried in the cemetery). The place was pretty sweet, if we can say that about human remains on exhibit. Skulls and bones everywhere...kinda kitchy, which made it feel less morbid than we thought. There was a large chandelier in the center that boasts every bone in the human body and it's surrounding decor all made from bones as well. There were four pyramids of bones in each corner of the church and the place was almost entirely adorned with what seemed to be laurel strands of bones...quite the sight to see. Even stranger was that the 'designer' was a wood carver, who actually disinfected and whitewashed every bone in the place (guess that's a valid day job in a ghost town).

So after not much of a dinner, since this town is dead (really, didn't you read the last paragraph), we headed back to Prague to end our trip with a personal beer tap. Sounds crazy, but this place knows how to satisfy a man (and two cute American girls). Day after day we walked by this restaurant where every table had a beer tap with 4 spouts, so it was now or never. And this place was pretty incredible! The food was yummy, fried everything to go with your beer (Pilsner, of course, it's their national beverage). Well, we loved it and concluded that this is something that should certainly be brought to the States. A place like this would make a fortune in any big city, just need to add a few plasma tv screens, and you may never see your man again. It was a perfect end to our lovely time in Prague! Off to bed for our trek to Vienna tomorrow.

• Monies

$1 USD = 17.67 CZK

• Foods

Restaurant Hybernia
Hybernska 7
+420 777 344 005
www.Hybernia.cz

• Hotel

Marriott Hotel

Another delightful, long sleep until 2pm (it's our vacation and we'll sleep if we want to) then ready to start with a yummy breakfast at the Imperial Hotel. Evidently this was the glamour hotel of Prague at the turn of the 20th century. Pretty swanky, we know! Today, still pretty snazzy but they also have yummy traditional English and American breakfast, much to our delight. Eggs, tea, toast, and bacon - yum-a-dum. So, over breakfast, we decided to stop by Mozart's house to pay him a visit.

The ride to Mozart's was pretty nice. Two trams and we were there (we're pretty proud of ourselves for finally starting to learn our way around this city). His house, located on Mozatova, of course, was tucked away in the hills. Looked pretty cute from the exterior. He even had a lovely garden at the base to relax, read, whatever. The main gate seemed to be closed, though the sign clearly stated open Thurs-Sun, and although we had slept til 2pm, we were pretty sure we knew what day it was (though this can often be confusing). So we spotted lovely little cobbled stairs that led around the house...this must be the way. After the trek up, we came to find that there certainly is no entrance at the top and no sign of Mozart anywhere. Poop! Little disappointing but we still had a few hours of daylight to check out the castle once more.

Yet again, amazing views from the Prague Castle. Around dusk, we could see all those charming red roofs below and the powerful Medieval churches above. Then, off for a romantic walk across the Charles Bridge, though not before spotting 'the mysterious Prague tinkler.' After making a pit stop in what turned out to be an amazing little bookstore, we came across a little gated area with an actual man peeing next to a statue of a man peeing.

Then after our romantic stroll, off to Al Capone's for din din (hilarious, we know). Food was pretty good for Italian in the Czech Republic. I still conclude nothing compares to NY (specifically Buffalo) pizza but still a safe bet for our tummies no less. Kinda a lazy evening (OK by me since I can feel the death cough coming on) before our final day in Prague. Stay tuned for bones, bones, and more bones. Nighty night kiddies!

• Monies

$1 USD = 17.67 CZK

• Foods

Imperial Hotel
Na Porici 15
+420 246 011 600

Al Capone's
Bartolomějská 305/3
224 212 192
-Bruchetta is delish, as was the pizza.

• Hotel

Prague Marriott Hotel
V Celnici 8
420-222-888- 888

Bye, bye Czech Inn...off to the Marriott. Swanky (we know) but hilarious because really not as swanky as the hostel we just left. After those slobs moved out the other day, we ended up with basically an apartment to ourselves! Not sure how this keeps happening to us, but we'll take it. I think it's because Europe loves us and we certainly heart it back. So our little apartment, that we just left, had a lovely double bed plus bonus room, plus kitchen, plus wi-fi (very necessary for ladies so dependent on their computers for entertainment), plus rainhead shower! And it only cost us $21 per person, per night!! Pretty good...it was. To the Marriott, where you have to pay for Interweb after paying a bunch for the room. We are excited for a tub though, especially since I picked up some lovely lavender bath salts yesterday. Delightful!

So, room change, then off to lunch at the ever so coveted Bohemia Bagel Restaurant. Seemed like fate brought us to this place since we've been dying for a bagel for the past few weeks (only really 16 days but seems like forever in bagel time). Sandwiches were average but certainly better than Hungarian French toast! More strolls around Old Town then back to get ready for the ballet.

We decided yesterday, after seeing a sign on the street, that the ballet in Prague would be delightful. We loved the symphony in Budapest so ballet in Prague seemed about right (me hoping too that it would be in some amazing venue so the $$ would be worth it just for that). We picked up tickets after lunch and headed over this evening. Kinda strange space but whatever. The ballet, though, not so good. Weird, overall. No orchestra and they didn't dance the whole score. And only really great dancer was the lead (thank the Lord). At least the dinner to follow made up for the less than extraordinary Swan Lake.

We stumbled upon a pizza/pasta joint on the 2nd floor of a building in Old Town...looked pretty nice from outside, so done and done! It was pretty delicious too!

On tap for tomorrow: the bone church (we really don't make this shtuff up). Evidently, in addition to the Sex Device and Torture Museums, there is a Bone Church in a little town about an hour from Prague. So the church is supposed to be made completely of human bones. Pretty creepy but why not, I guess. "So, what was the coolest thing about Prague?"..."Well, probably have to say the church we visited made completely out of human bones." I think that sounds about right...Contessa concurs. Verdict to be determined.

• Monies

$1 USD = 16.20 CZK (getting worse by the day)

• Foods

Bohemia Bagel Restaurant
Ujezd 16
+420 257310694
www.bohemia bagel.cz

Ambient Pizza
Revolucni 1
+420 221 803 309

• Hotel

Marriott (Marri-NOT)
relocated to a hotel and don't recommend it. Czech Inn was the shizzle. Highly recommend room 501 A, not B, but plus B if you want another double bed and experience not unlike having your own apartment.

So today was Mucha day. We started out strolling around looking for this cute art nouveau cafe. We eventually found it due to our amazing deductive reasonng skills, but turns out it must have been taken over by new management and the name changed so it's no wonder we were circling Prague for near an hour. Food was alright but the atmosphere certainly made up for it. This place was decked out in gold art deco ornamentation and overlooked the little square in Old Town, just outside the Gate. No extra special dessert (like cheesecake) but instead off with a non-fat Mucha in mind.

We made it to the Mucha Museum, which we were both equally excited about (this one will be worth the entrance fee). The exhibit was great! So inspiring and of course amazing to see the real thing that we oodle over on paper back home. And, come to find out, the building where our little breakfast (I mean lunch) cafe was had original Mucha designed stained glass, mosaics, and frescoes on the ceiling. Pretty sweet! We did a little damage in the bookstore then off to stroll the streets some more.

Oh, we also met a fellow Californian, which was pretty cool. Stopped into a recommended tattoo parlor, come to find out that the artist just recently moved to Prague from San Fran (better yet while in SF, he used to do work just 5 blocks from the house). Small world! He was super cool and we definitely concluded that this would be the spot if we decide to go for the plunge again. More than anything, it was just nice to run into someone that we clearly had a lot in common with. And he assured us that if you ever want to move to Eastern Europe, it would be super easy to get a job teaching English. Ha! Another option!!

Then for din din we found this cute little French creperie. Food was super yummy, of course, since you can't really beat crepes for dinner and dessert! Inside was kitchy and had little bells of all sorts strung from the ceiling. We likey!!

We walked through Old Town, checked out the beautiful Astronomical Clock and what was definitely the ritzy part of town. Good for our pockets since we certainly couldn't afford any of the designer goods. Overall the day was pretty lax but nice no less.

• Monies

$1 USD = 16.80 CZK (crazy, the longer we are here, the less our money is worth...go figure)

• Foods

Kavarna Obecni Dum
Namesti Republiky 5
110 00 Praha 1
+420 222 002 763-4

Creperie Aux Clochettes
Nardoni 37/38
110 00 Praha 1
296 325 793

• Hostel

Czech Inn

Hooray for us! We actually woke up at a reasonable hour and on time for breakfast while it was still morning. We started our day off right: eggs, toast, futball highlights, and other young eager travelers nearby ready to explore Prague. And we were pretty excited that our slob Aussie mates were checking out (we aren't being mean by saying that...they truly were slobs). But Contessa did comment when we walked into the apartment, "Oh great, we get to share this space with a bunch of slobs." So I guess they were pretty happy not to share the place with us too. Whatever, bye bye mates! Off and ready to head over to the Martinicky Palace for a tour of the set of the HBO series Borgia, we purchased our 20min tram tickets (keep in mind, we were assured at the front desk that 20min was all it takes to get to the Palace).

On the tram (and on time) with one stop to go we were approached by 2 Czech tram officials, who asked us for our tickets and proceeded to escort us off the tram. Wonderful timing - boo boo, hiss hiss! Evidently, we were 5min over on our tickets and here they don't let cute American girls get away with such atrocity. Note to all young, cute American girls: you are prey to Czech tram officials and unfortunately smiles don't charm them (at least not ones we encountered). Of course we didn't have 700 CZK each to pay the fine, so we were escorted to the closest ATM, passports confiscated, and free to go only after our fines were paid.

Amazingly enough, we still made it on time to the palace to meet Daphne and get a lovely tour of the set. This hidden gem in the city was beautiful, stock full of vaults, exposed and painted beam ceilings, and some remaining hand painted walls (all others hand painted recently to replicate the originals). Behind the scenes was pretty sweet! We saw some amazing costumes with luxurious Italian fabrics, painting in process, and even a few takes of a scene (actors, producers, and all). What a treat to begin our first day in Prague (and make us feel a little better about our unfortunate encounter with the Czech tram officials).

After the tour we explored the area surrounding the Prague Castle, with lovely views of the charming city below. We strolled again through cobbled streets, taking pictures and window shopping. Agreed that this city reminds us of a charming, romantic New York City. It's large, beautiful, timeless, and there is plenty to do and see. And, lucky for us, there are more people that speak English here than the other cities we have visited on the trip.

So back to the hostel, some Developmental Psychology for Contessa and Interweb for me. Little chats here and there about how Contessa "doesn't wanna read anymore about babies" and me hoping she truly is done reading (she definitely is uninhibited in giving me extremely detailed accounts of the birthing process, which I'd clearly rather not hear about). And a little planning of other neat things we can do in Prague. Evidently there is a pretty awesome astronomical clock, tv tube tower, Sex Device Museum (don't ask us, we are just reporting) and Museum of Torture Devices (which we may or may not be inclined to visit). We've concluded that tomorrow would be a perfect museum day, so we'll see what we get done once we see what time we wake up. We're really good at sleeping, as you may know if you've been following our blog.

• Monies

$1 USD = 17.71 CZK Czech Koruna

• Foods

- all you can eat breakfast at the hostel (see above description)
- hot dog from a Czech vendor on the street (gutted bun, like gutting an apple, dog stuffed inside with ketchup and mustard)
- (dry) Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Polish style
- sandwich and chips

• Hostel

Czech Inn
Francouzska 76
101 00 Prague