Prague - Day 1

I left on the early bus to Prague to with no problems, and was met by Honsa and Hanka at the bus station. I had seen a photo of them in Susice, but they looked much different from how I remembered them from fifteen years ago. We took the bus and subway to their apartment. Their apartment is interesting because it is located in a communist-era building. It is quite interesting to see how everyone lived during those times. Granted, the apartment is not bad, but it is very small for four people. My apartment in Montreal was bigger, and that had only two or one person living there. I was also delighted that Hanka offered to do my laundry. I was prepared to do quite a bit after arriving at the pension, but am thrilled I don't have to deal with it.

We then headed downtown on the tram, where we crossed the Charles bridge, which was hard to walk on due to hordes of tour groups. We also went to the museum of communism which was interesting. While in this area, we stopped by the famous clock to watch the apostles go by. There were hundreds of tourists gathered in anticipation. It was pretty dumb, however, as it was only some figures moving around very far in the distance. I also noticed that there were tons of Irish in the city, all wearing green shirts. Apparently there was a soccer game between the Czechs and Irish that night in which the winner would qualify for the world cup. Ireland lost. In Mala Strana, we headed up the hill on a funicular and climbed the mini-Eiffel tower at the top to get a great view of the city. Also at the top of the hill, we went to the museum of mirrors, which provided wierd distorted mirrors to see one's reflection in. After all this, we went to the bar U Sudu, which is apparently quite famous. There we had a few glasses of Burcak, which is apparently young white wine, and is surprisingly good. It almost tastes like a combination of wine and apple cider. I really liked it. Irena made us a dinner of fruit knedlicky, which I think are quite strange. It seems like they should be more of dessert food, however they are treated as a meal, and slathered with butter and cheese. After dinner, I went to the penzion, which is actually very nice.