Prague was the last stop on our 3 country train tour that began in Vienna. If you want to start from the beginning, you can go here.
We arrived in Prague around 2:00 in the afternoon. The train station, Praha Hlavni Nadrazi, is about a 5 minute walk to Wenceslas Square. We knew that there was a Metro station in the train station, but it wasn’t part of the Green line that would take us close to our hotel. We made the short walk down the street to catch the Metro at the Muzeum station. For some reason, the entrance to the station wasn’t obvious, and it took an English speaking person passing by to recognize that we were lugging around large suitcases with confused looks on our faces to point us to the Metro entrance. Once inside, we found that the machines only took cash… local cash. Ok, we’re smart, we’ll go to the little store down the hall. When we got inside the store, before saying anything, the cashier let us know that they did not provide change for the machines. Apparently, she had heard this story before. Well, can we buy something with our credit card and get change back? The cashier was not thrilled, but let us purchase a couple of cokes and gave us enough change to get us to our destination. Hopefully, by now, these machines have been replaced. We made the short trip to the Staromestska station and from there it was a short quarter mile walk to our hotel at the Intercontinental. This should have been a piece of cake, but after a few hundred yards of rolling our luggage over cobblestone, we were thrilled to get to our hotel.
The Intercontinental is ideally located right on the Vlatva River. It is only a 5-10 minute walk to the famous Old Town Square. The rooms at the hotel felt very western and had plenty of room to be comfortable in. Our room had a beautiful view of the Vlatva River.
The Sites
The Old town square was only a few minute walk from the hotel. There, you’ll find tourist sites such as the Gothic Church of Our Lady before Tyn, St. Nicholas Church, and the Astronomical Clock.
Old Town Square was a short walk from our hotel
Astronomical Clock was being refurbished
You’ll also find several cafes and shops to eat and browse through. Heading back toward the river, it is another 10 minute walk to the Charles Bridge, a medieval stone bridge completed in the 15th century.
Charles Bridge
The bridge is decorated by a row of statues. Rubbing some some of these statues is said to bring good luck, as seen from the “polishing” shown on some of them. The bridge is a great place to go to get a panoramic view of the Vlatva River and the surrounding city.
Good luck by rubbing some of the statues on the Charles Bridge
Amazing views at sunset from the Charles Bridge
The next morning, we made our way across the bridge to catch Tram 22 up the hill to Prague castle. We learned from various Youtube videos to skip the first few stops for the castle, and to ride the tram all the way up the hill to the Pohorelec stop. This stop is a bit further from the castle, but avoids any uphill walking… it’s all down hill to the castle. It also drops you off close to the Loreta, a Baroque style church containing several religious treasures. We were especially interested in seeing the Prague Sun, which is said to be encrusted with over 6000 diamonds.
The Loreta
The Prague Sun at the Loreta
Also before making your way down the hill, head over to visit the Strahov Monastery. Taking a look at the Theological Hall, or Library in the Monastery will be worth the short walk over. Unfortunately, we weren’t actually allowed into the hall, but you can get a great view of it from the entrance.
The library at the Strahov Monastery
While you are in that area, take a walk to a lookout point located at the Strahov Gardens. It is right under the outdoor seating area of the Bellavista restaurant. From that vantage point, you have a great view of the area below, including the Prague Castle.
Beautiful views from the garden at Strahov Monastery
We spent almost two full days wandering through the area around the Prague Castle. Some of the best views of Prague can be found at various look out points in the area.
Views from the walk down from Prague Castle
One area that I didn’t expect to enjoy, but I did, was wandering down Golden Lane. This narrow street contains miniature houses, beautifully restored and painted in pastel colors. The area used to provide the living quarters of castle workers but are now tourist shops. Reviews had warned that there would be tons of people on the street, but it wasn’t bad while we were there.
Golden Lane
There are a few areas closer to the Charles Bridge that might be worth wandering by. Just south of the Charles Bridge is the Lennon Wall which is filled with John Lennon inspired graffiti. The wall is usually packed with tourists and makes a great back drop for a picture or video.
Lenon Wall near the Charles Bridge
If you’re up for a metro ride, or a 20 minute hike, you can travel back toward the train station to Wenceslas Square, named after Saint Wenceslas. It is the main city square of Prague’s New Town. Located across the street from the square is the Narodni Museum and the location of our elusive Metro station when we first got into town.
If you have time, you might want to book a tour to the Kutna Hora Bone Church (Sedlec Ossuary). It is estimated to contain roughly 50,000 skeletons whose bones form some of the decorations in the chapel. It sounded interesting, oddly, but it’s an hour drive away and we weren’t able to make time for the half day trek there and back. Next time. Maybe.
The Food
Our first day in Prague, we looked for a place to eat near Old Town Square. We had researched a few places and settled on Terasa U Prince, a terrace restaurant atop the U Prince hotel. The restaurant did not disappoint. The food was really good and the views from the rooftop were stunning.
We had heard that the Hard Rock cafe in Old Town had a giant crystal guitar hanging from its ceiling. Yes, there wasn’t anything spectacular or different about eating at a Hard Rock cafe, but I could pick up a t-shirt, and eating upstairs looking down at the crystal guitar was very cool.
Perhaps our new favorite dessert is the Trdelnik. You can find it being made at several street side stands in Old Town. It is made by wrapping dough around a cylinder and grilling it over a fire. There are usually a bunch of other decadent things added to it such as cinnamon or chocolate. I guess it’s basically a cylindrical doughnut, but it tasted much better than that.
We took a cab back to the train station and we headed back to Vienna. After another night in Vienna, we flew back home. We were thrilled at the way that the vacation had turned out. Travelling from city to city via the train didn’t end up to be as daunting an experience as we thought it would be. We thoroughly enjoyed each of our stops and couldn’t wait to come back.
