Our first full day and last day in Bohemia 10-22-15

Today was our full day in Cesky Krumlov so we went up to the castle that sits above the city.  When I was here with Gail, Peter, and David Howell last year I took the tour and thought that Deb would enjoy it as well.
We walked across the square and over the bridge on the road leading up to the castle.  This will be a surprise by now but it was an overcast day and pretty cool as well.  But the road up to the castle is pretty steep and we kept warm with the exertion.  When we got to what was originally the drawbridge we looked over into the moat and saw one of the bears that they keep down there, he was as big as the bears we have in Guffey probably 400 pounds.  There have been bears in the old moat since the 1600's when they were first put down there.  As we were touring the castle rooms there were many rooms with bear skin rugs, the predecessors of the current residents.
All the tours are guided so we were part of a group of around 20, and again there are no photos allowed, what's up with that?  Be that as it may we had a very interesting visit and I was able to pull together a bit of Czech history when I recognized that the wife of one of the very early counts became the wife of one of the Lobkowicz counts after her first husband died.  It seems that one of the early counts "manufactured" a family tie with the ancient Roman family, the Orsinis.  I guess puffing your resume is certainly not new, as this took place in the 1500's.  It was fun to see this again since I made the tour with my sister, Gail, last year.  In a senior moment I could have sworn that I took pictures during the tour last year but I can't find them on my machine so I must have imagined it.
After the tour we walked up the hill to the palace gardens and had an hour's walk through it.  The gardeners are sweeping leaves and cleaning up for the coming winter, but there were blooming waterlilies in the pond, I don't know why but I thought they were more tropical plants.  I first saw them in a lake on the continental divide west of Jasper, Alberta 3 years ago and I was astonished, yet here they are again.





Eventually we walked back through the castle and I took time to climb to the top of the tower that pretty much dominates the town.  I didn't do that last year so this year it was a must.  The vistas are incredible and it was fun to see over the whole town and the castle at the same time.


There is also an ancient brewery here in Cesky Krumlov, Eggenberg, founded in 1560 and still making beer,  When we found it last year it was after closing time and we missed visiting, so this year I made it a priority.  We went in and had a late lunch, with a sampling pint of each of their 3 offerings, I love locally made beer so it was a treat.  The food was good as well.   After lunch we walked back to the hotel and spent a quiet evening.

Into the Heart of Bohemia - Cesky Krumlov 10-21-15

We left Prague to catch the 9:30 train but we arrived over an hour early so we grabbed the 8:30 train to where we would catch the train to Cesky Krumlov, that being Cesky Budejovice where we spent an hour walking around town waiting for the connecting train.  Once we got on the connecting train we were working our way towards CK when the conductor came and told us that at Kremze we would have to get off and take a bus from there.
But on the way a group of elderly women got on, about 15, and two sat next to us, does it resonate when I say that we had very few words in common? At any rate when the conductor told us about the detour, one of the women took us under wing and made sure we got on the correct bus and tried to help us once we got to Cesky Krumlov.  But I had to make sure that we will get our connection to Vienna in two days so I stayed at the station and got that cleared up.  Of course the next bus to come up was questionable due to the station being basically closed.  Luckily after several minutes two taxis came roaring up and jettisoned a group of Japanese tourists (to catch the next bus to the train I think) and we hijacked one of them to take us to our hotel.

I really scored on this reservation, the room is less than $80/night and it's a 4 star hotel right on the square in the old part of town the room is gigantic and we have a separate sitting room as well as a large bathroom.  Quite lovely with arched ceilings and stone floors.
After we got settled we had a light lunch and then walked around town for a few hours, getting Deb oriented.  We then went back to the hotel and Deb wanted to rest so I took my camera and followed several little lanes that I never got a chance to look at the last time.  It was very relaxing to walk around and try to get interesting pictures.

After her rest we went to dinner at the hotel and had a fine dinner, Deb had pork medallions with green peppers and chanterelles, while I had half a roast duck with red cabbage and sauerkraut, delicious. I asked the server to tell the chef that the duck was delicious and in response he sent us each a small digestif, a Czech herb liqueur for me and an apricot eau-de-vie for Deb.  What a great dinner.  We're really looking forward to tomorrow and a tour of the castle and town.

Our Last Day in Prague 10-20-15

Today is our last full day in Prague, I wanted to take Deb to the Mucha Museum and she wanted to see the Lobkowicz Collection.
So since the Lobkowicz is up near St. Vitus in the Palace complex we decided to go there first.  So we walked over to the tram stop we used yesterday and rode up to the appropriate stop before getting off.  As we walked towards the gate we passed the Royal Gardens and walked in to have a look.  It was created in the 1500's and has been functioning ever since.  It is among other things an arboretum and has many specimen trees from around the globe, but it was also the first place in Europe to begin cultivating tulips and introduced them to the Netherlands.  It is quite attractive and very well kept up, the gardeners were preparing new beds for winter planting as we walked through.  The views of the cathedral from the gardens are quite good, certainly much better than anywhere in the palace complex.
So we walked through the complex past the cathedral and down to the Lobkowicz palace.  It is at the lower end almost at the lower gate.  Their family story is certainly dramatic, they were a noble family that operated very close to the monarchs of the Holy Roman Empire and the Hapsburg Austro-Hungarian Empire from the 15th century up to the 20th century.  Things were still going well until the Nazi occupation when everything was confiscated, after the defeat of Germany their possessions were restored to the family only to be confiscated again when Czechoslovakia was absorbed into the Soviet sphere.  The family escaped to the U.S. and lived in New York until the fall of the Iron Curtain and emergence of the Czech Republic.  In the early 90's they came back and made claims against the new government and were granted much of their previous property and palaces.  At that point they were land rich and money poor so it seems likely that they ceded some of  their previous property to the republic and then created a foundation and museum to showcase their former glory to the public.
The first exhibition rooms display two rooms of portraits of family and friends, like the Holy Roman Emperor and the king of Spain.  The next room shows family dinner services dating from the 1500's to the 1900's. This is followed by historic religious relics, armaments, and musical instruments.  In the musical displays are the original manuscripts of Mozart's reorchestration of Handel's Messiah and Beethoven's 4th and 5th symphonies in their own hands.  There are then artworks by Breugel, Canaletto, and Cranach to round out the floor.  Throughout the floor they refer to larger collections of various things at the other two palaces they have just outside Prague.   We then finished with a tour of the next floor of family oriented rooms with minimal furnishings but many artworks on the walls.
After our visit to the museum we ate lunch at the palace cafe to finish out the morning.
We then rode down hill and visited the Mucha Museum, dedicated to the works of Alfons Mucha, the first major proponent of the Art Nouveau movement.  It's not a large museum and they don't allow photographs so other than to say that it's quite interesting and has many beautiful works on display I will just recommend it to visitors to Prague.

A Beautiful Library and the Palace Complex 10-19-15

Some of Deb's reading has turned up a library in Prague that appears on a list of the world's most beautiful, that of the Strahov Monastery. So we found a tram stop near us that would take up to within a short walk of our goal. Of course, we misread the tram stop and got off one stop too early so the short walk turned into a little longer walk.  But on the positive side it allowed us to see another quiet place in Prague, a palace that is not on any radar.  As we sat in the garden next to the palace I talked with a gardener to find out where we needed to go to find where we wanted to go.  She was spot on and we found the monastery without any trouble.

Curiosity Cabinets

Theological Library

The library has two distinct wings one is dedicated to the theological written word while the other is focused on the philosophical world.  They are both very beautiful, one is almost intimate while the other is monumental in scale.  They don't allow visitors into the library without prior reservations but they have a vestibule wherein they keep cabinets of princely collectibles from the 16th and 17th centuries.  The abbots of the monastery were nobles and had the means to build a library and collections this impressive.  The natural history collection is quite dated and perfectly in keeping with it's time period.

After our visit to the library I spotted a monasterial brewery, Sv. Norbert (Saint Norbert) where they had a seasonal brew, "Antidepressant", that I just had to taste.  So we stopped there and had a lunch based on goulash, Deb had goulash soup while I had goulash and dumplings it was quite delicious. We actually had sunshine so we sat outside and basked.

Mucha Stained Glass Window

We spent the rest of the afternoon visiting Prague castle which is the largest ancient castle in the world.  It contains more palaces for nobles than I've ever seen in one place and the St Vitus basilica. We spent an hour going through the basilica then went in to the goldsmiths lane, then the St. George chapel and the royal palace to finish out the day.  We were a bit footsore from walking on cobbles and took the tram back to our stop.  I dropped Deb off at the hotel then went over to the train station to buy tickets for Cesky Krumlov and then Vienna.  It also gave me a chance to time how long it would take from our hotel on the morning we leave.   When I got back we went for dinner at one of the perhaps 200 beer halls that exist here in Prague.

A Sunday in Prague 10-18-15

Today started out cold and moist, we even saw a couple flakes or so we imagined.  We got out around 10:00 and caught the subway out to a suburb to the main flea market of Prague.  I thought it may be a bit less sophisticated than those of Paris, but they may about equal in what a person will see. There are people out there who are selling garage sale stuff and there are others that have permanent setups with little metal buildings and lots of stuff.   Due to yesterdays rain the venue was muddy and dotted with many puddles. But people were out with a will and they were taking out all sorts of things; furniture, auto tires,  appliances, clothes, skis, etc.  We didn't find anything but we had a good time looking around.
After we finished we headed back to the hotel and did a little maintenance before going to lunch. Our dear friend Charla told us about a restaurant, Kampa Park, which sits on the river right next to the Charles bridge.  So we went there for lunch and had just a delicious time.  We sat at a table right next to the river and out came the sun for the only time all day.  We started with a pumpkin soup and then Deb had a Pike fillet while I had a lamb shank in a cassoulet of fava beans and carrots.  As I said before delicious.

After lunch we walked in the neighborhood on the west side of the river, Malastrana, admiring the architecture and the feel of the neighborhood.  We walked past the building in which Beethoven lived during his time here and then over to the John Lennon wall.  After that we sat in the Kampa Park and watched the boats cruising on the river before going back across the river for a concert.






We stopped at the baroque Catholic church that immediately faces the end of the Charles Bridge for an organ recital, they played Bach, Vivaldi, Mozart, Albinoni, and other works.  In addition to the organist there was a soprano, and a violin accompanying it.  The soprano's voice was so clear, high, and strong that she carried perfectly all over the church.  The church itself is classic baroque, highly decorated but with restrained taste, except for the altar.


Then it was back to the hotel.

Into the Czech Republic 10-17-15

We left Berlin this morning just before 9:00 on our way to Prague, we were seated in a compartment of 6 seats and from Berlin to Prague we had at least 2 under 5 children in the compartment, very lively!
The line goes basically south from Berlin to Dresden and very soon travels along the Elbe river valley into the Czech Republic.  The valley is very appealing as it is lined with small towns nestled below large rock outcropping within heavy forestation.  We followed the river  up to where the Vltava evidently feeds into it and into Prague arriving around 1:30pm.  We spent a couple minutes in the tourist bureau getting public transport tickets and a map with directions to our hotel in the Stare Mestro (old town) area.
After check-in we left the hotel and walked over to the town hall where the medieval clock is located and then over to the Charles bridge.  We crossed the bridge and walked into the neighborhood just to the north where the Kafka museum is located.


In the courtyard there is a kinetic sculpture called "Pissing Men" by David Cerny, and that's just what it is.  But what is interesting is that the men piss such that they are writing Czech words and if a person texts to a specific number they will "write" the text message quite amusing.
We continued along the river up to the north as far as the next bridge and crossed back into old town but in the old Jewish quarter.  There we found a new cafe dedicated and decorated with a bicycle theme and decided to eat there.  The first question when we entered was funny, "Smoking or Non-Smoking section?" a bicycling cafe? Really?  In any event the food was good and the beer was very fresh, Pilsner Urquell.  After dinner we walked back to the hotel, with only a couple wrong turns.

Nice Low-key Friday 10-16-15

Today we played it pretty low key, we got out around 11:00 and took a bus to an area where we saw a group of antiques stores when we took the bus tour around town.  When we arrived it turned out that most of the stores are only open in the afternoon so we walked around for about an hour until things opened up.
Once stores opened we went to a few and then decided to head back to KA DA WE, a store  that is to Berlin very much like Harrods is to London.  It carries good quality up to true luxury merchandise, but it appears that they allow the very highest end products to be their own boutiques within the store. So you will see Hermes, Rolex, Burberry, etc in their own areas but they will also carry well known brands in large shared areas.   In addition they have one complete floor dedicated to foods and eating. There are at least 20 small areas on the floor where one can sit and enjoy the specialities offered right there.  In addition they have wine areas, baked goods, produce, fish, meat, cured meat etc. delimited by country.  There must have been at least 500 people all eating, shopping, wine tasting, beer drinking, and more throughout the floor.  We stopped and had small lunch of sausages for lunch, then we walked around and bought the makings for a lunch tomorrow on the train to Prague.   In the evening we went out to a Berlin pub and had specialties of the city.  Deb had a pork schnitzel while I had a potato soup and a stuffed cabbage with potatoes of course washed down with local Berlin beer. I was derelict in taking pictures so here are some interesting buildings we saw today, they seemed to be interspersed with newer kind of blah buildings.  Did they survive the bombing of WWII in Berlin?