Prague - Day 3

Due to my late night I was rather tired in the morning, and was being pciked up early by Irena, as we were going to Karlstejn, which is a bit of drive from Prague. Karlstejn is one of the most important castles in the Czech republic, and used to hold the crown jewels. Upon arriving, we took a shuttle up to the castle, as Hanka is on crutches, and the walk is two kilometers. Honza did not come with us, as he had an exam today. The castle itself is very impressive from the outside, being located on top of a hill, and looking very handsome, if that is the right word for it. Unfortunately the inside of the castle was less-impressive, and in my opinion, not worth it. We were forced to go on a tour that only went through five rooms, and missed the most important part of the castle. Apparently the main tower is restricted to fifteen people per hour and requires a reservation. After finishing, we walked down through the tourist town all the way to parking lot and stopped for lunch along the way. It was swarming with tourists. Following Karlstejn, we went to another chateau, Zbraslav, which is also a museum of Asian art. While the chateau's impressive exterior architecture is not mirrored in its interior, the Asian art was surprisingly good. In particular, the museum had the oldest Chinese bronze mirror I have ever seen, dating back three thousand years. This museum was far better than the equivalent in Beijing. In the evening we went to performance of a weird circus thing that mixed actors with film. It was very strange and disconcerting, in particular the part with giant puppets. Irena forced everyone to dress-up for it, including me. However, this was tourist performance, and as I suspected, we were way too overdressed.