Prague, Day 2
The second day in Prague we woke up to snow! It was a slushy, watery snow that didn’t really stick to the ground, but it was still snow! The kids were thrilled. Today we walked through the Old Town of Prague. We took a shortcut through a shopping center with most of the shops closed and saw this crazy statue hanging from the ceiling. An upside-down horse with its tongue sticking out and the rider sitting on it from wrong side. So weird.
Our first stop was Sight Uncertainty, statues of a man and a woman hanging above the street from umbrellas.
The next stop was the rotating Kafka head, which lined up and then rotated around and around until lining up again. We stood and watched this for quite a while; it was so cool.
Next we saw a statue of a woman sitting naked, and Ronin said she must be really cold sitting here in the snow with no clothes on. This led us to Man Hanging Out, a statue of Sigmund Freud hanging onto a pole high above the road. We then walked by several interesting sites on our way back to the Charles bridge, including a nativity scene, another straw angel, a restaurant with a beautiful Christmas setup for outside dining, the Old Prague House which was cute, and an interesting infinity of divers.
Prague is known as the city of a hundred spires, which means there are plenty of towers to climb. We chose to do only two since it gets expensive paying for a family of 5—the Petřín lookout tower yesterday and the Charles bridge tower today. There were a few stops going up to the top of the tower, and we were glad to get out of the cold for a bit.
I really liked the views from the top of the tower from all angles. The bridge, the river, the city. You could see all the spires sticking up above the city, and St. Vitus Cathedral at the top of the castle on the west ide of the city.
In the basement of the tower was a tiny exhibit of some of the items pulled up from the water, both ancient and recent. The kids were amused by some of the newer items, such as cell phones from the early 2000s. There was also a small ‘theatre’ with an animated video telling a fairy tale story of how the bridge was built. Apparently there was a magic sword and eggs from black hens and magic water demons. It was a little weird, but the kids watched it twice. There was only one chair and Ronin let Willow sit on his lap. I was afraid the tiny metal chair would break under their wiggling!
Although it was gray, cloudy, and still spitting rain/snow, we walked across the bridge and back. The kids wanted to look for the magical things listed in the video, and I watched a street group play a quartet.
We walked up toward the Jewish quarter. We were going to go into the synagogues and cemetery, but our budget only allowed for one thing today and we were saving it for later. Instead, we took pictures of the outside of the Old-New Synagogue, the oldest active synagogue in Europe, and the Klausen Synagogue. We got as close as we could to the Old Jewish Cemetery, which is a walled cemetery with over 12,000 gravestones built on top of gravestones of up to ten layers, many that are crooked and all at least 350 years old.
We made our way back to the Old Town Square where we watched the astronomical clock chime on the hour (it wasn’t that exciting but there was a huge crowd waiting for the show) and walked around the square looking at the beautiful architecture. You can see the Christmas stalls all set up and ready for market, but the markets were closed.
We saw Santa and Mrs. Claus! Santa was really great looking, but Mrs. Claus looked like she had seen better days and was smoking a cigarette while talking with the kids. They were from Sweden and gave the kids postcards. We went in several souvenir stores and Ronin loved the ones that sold a bunch of nesting dolls. He got this picture of a whole room of nesting dolls (he loves these things—remember he got one for his birthday). There were several yummy cake shops and tons of places selling chimney cake, but they were all so much more expensive than what we can get in Budapest that it was hard to justify the expense. Sometimes I wish we weren’t always thinking about how much things cost, but it is just a fact of life.
We decided to go to the Illusion Art Museum, which ended up being really cool! There were lots of optical illusions and places on the floor that told you where to stand to take pictures from the right perspective. The first pictures are supposed to look like the kids are falling through the floor (it doesn’t translate as well on the blog pictures but looks great on my phone), and the last is the kids participating in the defenestration of Prague. There is also JonPaul ripping off a piece of the Last Supper and getting hit by a meteorite. All of these are flat paintings but look 3D.
Some of the other optical illusions are the never-ending triangle, the picture in the mirror from a different angle, the portrait made of trash bags, and Van Gogh’s Cyprus Trees made from trash being dumped from a trash can with wings.
Some of the other optical illusions were made with different colored lenses. The red and blue mess turns into a work of art, and the man/skeleton is one or the other depending on the colored lenses put on (reminds me of National Treasure). Zoey is also getting knighted by the queen! The museum is right across the street from the astronomical clock, so there were plaques with the history of the square and Prague throughout the museum, which I thought was a nice touch. Finally, in the basement was an exhibit of NFTs (non-fungible token) that could be bought. Since JonPaul is really into cryptocurrency, he loved this part of the exhibit!
Some of the coolest illusions in the museum were the anamorphic creations made with actual items. The first is a bunch of stuff you would find in a kid’s room, and when viewed from the front looks like a baby. The next is made of shoes and is of Tomáš Baťa, the founder of a Czech shoe company. The third is made of electronic devices and is of Nikola Tesla, and the fourth is of Smetana, a Czech composer.
We went to dinner at the Sad Man’s Tongue Bar and Bistro, which was amazing. They are known for burgers, and ours were so good. The kids got chicken fingers and fries, and they ate them all, even Willow.
In the bathroom was this sign just in case you didn’t know. The overflowing toilet ruins their dreams.
We walked back through the Old Town and got more treats, but this time everyone wanted a marshmallow fruit or vegetable. I couldn’t resist getting a few more pictures of Prague at night.
As we made our way back to the hotel to pick up our bags (they held the bags for us the whole day) we took one more walk though the small Christmas market, or what was left of it. There were mostly just food and wine stalls, and not that many that were open. I did like how they made their chimney cakes over hot coals instead of an electronic heater.
I think the best part of our trip, at least for the kids, was the trip back home. We took the night train, which didn’t leave until almost 10:00 at night. Willow even found a painted rock at the train station, which she was super excited about! The sleeper cars had three-bunk rooms and were separated by boys and girls. In our bunk Zoey got the top bunk, Willow got the middle bunk, and I got the bottom bunk. I was glad there was a railing that pulled up; I was really nervous one of the kids would fall off! In the boys room Ronin got the top bunk and JonPaul took the middle bunk. There was another guy that had the bottom bunk. The kids got to watch a movie on their tablets and then went to sleep. Although I woke up a lot and dozed off and on, the kids slept like rocks. They absolutely loved it and it is something that I think they will talk about for a long time.
