Partying Prague

Day one:

Lennon Wall

We arrived in Prague from Bratislava. Our hostel, Sir Toby's, was quite out of the way. At first I was disappointed to see that we were so far away from the city center in a quiet, uninteresting neighborhood, but the hostel itself turned out to be very nice and bustling. It was also close to a club that had a lot of good reviews so Nathan and I decided to check it out. Our only real "night out" of the entire trip seemed to be appropriate in Prague, a city famed for its social scene. The club turned out to be a really cool place that consisted of a whole bunch of rooms with interesting decor, the lower ones having music and more of the club scene but the rest being a restaurant. We popped into the club part and couldn't stand the electronic music so just hung out for a bit on the multileveled deck which was packed with people. We're not exactly party animals, so we headed back to the hostel after relaxing for a bit.

Day Two:

We started off by visiting the castle area, which had the palace and cathedrals. It was quite an extensive set up, but we got to see a lot of it. After taking Euro History, it was fun to see where the famed Defenestration of Prague occurred in the palace (throwing Catholics out the window and starting the Thirty Years War). We then looked at an art collection, the senate house, St. Nicholas Church, the Lennon Wall (I added my own cliched mark), the Kafka museum, Charles bridge, Charles bridge museum, and walked around the old town district. We stopped by the Hard Rock Cafe and then grabbed a sausage dinner from street vendors. 

View of the Tyn church from the clock tower

Day three:

On the third day we started off by looking at the municipal building (famous for its art nouveau) and watching the famous clock in the town square strike the hour with its moving figures. Then we went to the Jan Hus monument, St. Nicholas church (a second one- confusing, I know), toured the town hall, climbed the clock tower, visited synagogues in the Jewish Quarter, and then went to Vysehrad Park which is in a old cliff top fortress. There we snacked and napped so we could have a quick break from touring. Then we continued again, going to Wenceslas Square and the Museum of Communism. The museum was quirky and interesting; I really enjoyed it. After a delicious food stall dinner (the roasted ham is sooo good), we watched the sunset over the river and ended our evening with a drink at the famous Americky Bar in the Municipal House, apparently one of the oldest bars in Europe.

Early morning on the Charles Bridge

Day four:

Our last day in Prague. We got up super early to pack and check out then rushed to Charles Bridge so we could see the bridge nice and empty of tourists. It was really cool to see the city before it filled up with masses of foreigners. We wandered around until restaurants opened and then had breakfast, after which we popped into Tyn Church. We then spent the afternoon walking around and enjoying the city without a rush to go see things. The last thing we visited was the Veletrzni Palace, a massive modern and contemporary art museum. It was too big to see everything, but we did get to see some of it's giant collections. We then had dinner, got our bags from the hostel, and got on our night train.

Touching this statue means you'll return

Conclusion:

Prague was one of my favorite cities. It seemed to have a lot more tourists though, definitely more big tour groups. Lots of Americans too which hadn't necessarily been the case elsewhere. Prague is famous for its partying scene, which we didn't really experience on this visit, but you can definitely get the party vibe from the city- lots of young people and energy. Interesting historic sites, pretty city on a river, and an extensive yet walkable city centre/old town area made Prague a great place to visit. Definitely need to go back at some point.