Favorite Corners - Prague
We expected to see a city of grim Gothic spires and buildings clad in moody, soot-covered stone. Instead, we found Prague to be a city, full of color, art, and music. We also managed to fit in a day trip to an old mining town called Kutna Hora to see a chapel decorated with human skeletons. Parents with children, this is your warning. Bones lie at the end of this post.
The 600 year old astronomical clock is the oldest in the world, and still working hard.
Inside the library is a circular sculpture that has a very "into the rabbit hole" feel a la Alice in Wonderland and is made of rows and rows of books.
The modern subway stations reminded us of the inside of a Dalek.
Gargoyles and glass from St. Vitrus Cathedral in Prague castle.
We spent a large amount of time in Prague admiring the works of Czech Art Nouveau artist Alphonse Mucha. This is a stained glass from St. Vitrus, but there is also a 20 painting collection entitled the "Slav Epic" (all done on massive canvases) that is housed in The National Gallery.
There is also the small Mucha Museum that shows many of his earlier commissioned work.
So, I was shopping in a toy store when this green guy comes over...
The toy store was giving free rides on the carousel. We couldn't resist.
This is the Dancing House, a unique architectural design to see among the older style buildings.
The Klementinum holds the National library, a weather monitoring station, a stunning baroque library (no pictures allowed) and also offers stunning views of the city (shown here).
A visit to Prague wouldn't be complete with a walk along Charles Bridge to see the Vltava river, art vendors, and the jumble of domes, spires, slate, stone and copper that make up the beautiful buildings of Prague.
The Old Jewish Cemetery contains thousands of tombstones (and the bodies of many more), but it's the nearby Pinkas Synagogue that offers a sobering moment, with its walls covered, floor to ceiling, in names of Czech and Moravian Jews that died in the Holocaust.
We took in an evening string concert of Mozart, Vivaldi, Bach, and Dvorak at the Rudolfinum.
On our final day, we discovered that there was a cat cafe very close to our place. Five cats and tea. A sweet afternoon.
A day trip took us to Kutna Hora to see the eerie bone chapel.