Walking Tour of Old Prague

Day 2 in Prague

After a good night's sleep We started off with a wonderful relaxing breakfast at our hotel.  Myra had a typical Czech breakfast of potato soup and fresh peach juice.

We walked over the historic Charles Bridge from the Mala Strana area of the city where we are staying to Stare Mesto (Old Town) for a free "Royal Walking Tour". During our 2 1/2 hour tour, we saw many historic sites including the Astronomical Clock, theatres, churches and obtained historical information about the Czech Republic and insights about the Czech people.  

The Astronomical Clock was installed in 1410 and depicts the hour in Prague local time based on a 24 hour day, the position of the sun and the moon in the sky, the signs of the zodiac and changes in the seasons.  The 4 characters (left to right) represent the fear of vanity, the fear of greed, fear of death and the fear of outside influences.

It was more fun watching the people watching the clock than watching the clock!

Some of our more interesting takeaways from our tour guide included:

If anything is stolen in Prague, the Czech citizens joke that it must have been the Swedes.  The joke stems from Sweden stealing art from the Prague Palace after the Thirty Years War in 1648 and never giving it back.  The Swedish army took an immense collection of priceless artworks, manuscripts and statues that had been accumulated by the royal family from all over the world.  The Swedes still have it all.

The Czech's have a colorful, alcoholic and glutinous president.  Two of his favorite quotes are "Death to Abstainers and Vegetarians" (while addressing a group of winemakers) and "Death to teetotalers  and vegetarians".  The castle flies a flag over the Prague Castle when he is in the country.  When he is out of the country and the flag is not visible the citizens claim to be on high alert because he will probably say something to embarrass the country.

The Czechs ceased Stalinist Rule in 1989 after a series of peaceful student protests.  This is referred to as the Velvet Revolution.  Four years later the Czechs separated peacefully from Slovakia and that is referred to as the Velvet Divorce.

Another piece of information that was shared during the tour was that earlier this year the Government has requested that the UN refer to the Czech Republic as Checkia.  They did this without input from the citizens which was not a popular move.

After the tour we had wonderful gelato and walked to Josefov, the Jewish Quarter. The area contains a Museum, the Old-New Synagogue, and the oldest (in use from 1439 to 1787) and largest Jewish cemetery in Europe.  Over 120,000 people are buried, sometimes stacked 12 deep. The monuments to mark the dead, most of which are illegible, look like a dense forest of head stones.

We then walked back to the main square and met some friends from Saint Simons Island - Phil and Carol Campbell - for a Czech dinner.  We discovered we were going to overlap in Prague for a day prior to their taking a Viking River Cruise.

We strolled back over the Charles Bridge at dusk and took in the wonderful sites of the city.  We had been gone 12 hours!