Tying Up Loose Ends in Prague

Friday, Aug. 8, 2014--Prague

Today was our last day in Prague.  We had only a few sights left on our list of places to see, so we decided to take our time and enjoy the beautiful day--sunshine with a light, cool breeze.  It was perfect weather.

We first headed to the old Jewish quarter of town to see some of the places we had missed when we walked through the center of it earlier on the trip.  We found crowds of people waiting to tour the old synagogues, the cemetery, etc.  We found it interesting to see the architecture of the buildings on the outside, but we didn't want to go inside.  To be honest, whether it is a synagogue, a church, or even a museum, we are getting tired of touring buildings.

Next, we walked along the riverfront until we came to the Fred and Ginger building--called that as a nickname in place of its generic title of Dancing House.  It is a modern building I remember seeing featured in TIME a few years ago as representing new ideas in architecture as well as representing the changes taking place in Prague as it pulled itself back to life after years under communism.

We continued even further south along the river and climbed a steep hill to reach Vysehrad, a hilltop fortress with the large SS Peter & Paul Church, a cemetery where many famous Czechs are buried, a large park, and the old city walls intact.  It was so pleasant there that we sat for an hour in the park and watched people coming and going, listened to a violinist playing, and just enjoyed the fresh air in the shade.

On the way back into town, we stopped at the Botanical Gardens.  Unfortunately, they are suffering from the dryness of the summer weather.  They have many glass houses with appropriate plants doing well in them, but the outdoor flowers just aren't getting enough water to be lush and nice.

Returning to the center of town from there, we stopped at Karlovo namesti, a final park where many people from the neighborhood were sunbathing, visiting, etc.  Beside us on the bench was a family with all their luggage.  We couldn't tell where they were from, because they never spoke during the hour we were there.  We surmised that they had checked out of their hotel around noon when required to do so and were waiting in the park until time to catch a night train to wherever they were going.  It must have been hard for the teenage son and daughter to sit there, but it seemed as if the parents weren't about to let them wander off.  We also found it humorous to watch various other people and their reactions to others--two guys sunbathing and their girlfriends chatting, eating, and getting restless; a homeless woman who took off her top and washed it in the fountain; a woman who came to the park to read and had to sit beside the homeless woman and became disgusted by her smoking and her wearing only a bra; etc.

We returned to the apartment in the early evening.  I made us a dinner of sandwiches and a prepared salad with mayonnaise, peas, carrots, etc.  For dessert, we had an apple kolache.  It wasn't as good as the ones at home in Texas, because the dough wasn't yeasty, but it came from Tesco.  The equivalent would be for a person from France eating a croissant from the HEB bakery, I guess!

We spent much of the evening finalizing plans for a place to stay in Warsaw.  We eventually settled on a hotel rather than an apartment.  That's the last place where we will be traveling together.  When we leave there, Wes will head to Berlin for 3 days before going home, and I will head to Krakow and other destinations for another 5 weeks.