Last night I packed most of my things in my backpack and got everything ready for the morning. Nic and Dorota came to my apartment around 8:30 and we headed to "The Pea and Carrot," that is the translation anyway. We sat down at their favorite table near the door. I was the only one to use an English menu, but Nic recommended what to order, so I didn't really need it. I will need to email Nic to get the proper names and spellings of what I ate, because I can't remember. I ate a type of crepe with spinach, broccoli and cream inside, it was really good. Nic and Dorota ordered a soup, Nic's had sausage in it and Dorota's had egg. I tried Nic's and I thought it was great. They also ordered potato cakes, which I tried and I thought were amazing. For drinks we shared two beers, they were out of the Polish beer so we had to order others. One was Ukranian and one was Australian? I can't remember, my sleep depravation is going straight to my head. I will have to get details from Nic. But, what I do remember is Carrot Juice! We each ordered a glass of fresh carrot juice, which looked like a very orange milkshake. It was really good! I thought it was going to be terrible, but it tasted exactly like carrots. It was something new for me to try and I would order it again, if I think I need a serious intake of Vitamin E in the near future. We had a nice dinner and chatted about a lot of things, including what my next move is after Europe. They tried to convince me to stay in Paris and work at my Uncle's shop for a few months. Jim, what do you think about that?! :)
They walked me home and it was off to bed. I set three alarm clocks on my phone for 5:00, 5:05 and 5:10. I wanted to make sure I didn't miss my train! I got up to the second alarm and got ready for my day of traveling. I was a little surprised that all my belongings fit into my backpack once again, but I did it! I walked about 10 minutes to a train stop and jumped on a train to make my walk a little easier. Two stops later was my stop and I walked to the train station. I saw my train would be arriving at Peron (Platform) 2 and made my way there. I was sitting there for about 5 minutes when this little dinky train pulled up and my first thought was, "no way, no way!" But yes way, it was my train. It took me a little while to figure out which cart was mine because the numbers were taped on the door in the very bottom corner in the most faded color of red I have ever seen. It was more like a light pink. But I climbed into Cart 350, once I figured out which one it was and looked for my seat number, 51. The cart is broken up into about 10 different compartments, each housing 6 seats. My compartment had a couple just about my age taking pictures inside and talking English! Alright I thought! Someone to watch my luggage when I have to use the bathroom! They asked me where I was from and I said hesitantly, "Nebraska." They just replied, oh and so I asked where they were from. They said Canada, I asked where in Canada, they said Alberta and we left it at that. I swear they weren't Canadian though, they didn't even have the slightest accent. They could have just as easily been from Nebraska, but I did see their Canadian passports so it was confirmed.
The train pulled out of the station at 7:00 and the three of us dozed in and out of sleep as we moved along. The 7 hour train ride would have been a lot better if it would have been direct, but instead we were stopping and going constantly. I would wake up everytime we stopped and try to move around to get comfortable, but it just wasn't happening. About 3 hours in, I gave up and started reading about my destination, Prague.
An hour or so later a very annoying couple and their 3 or 4 year old son decided to join our compartment for seats. The man and woman sat across from me while their son sat between me and the Canadian girl. They had no regard for overcrowding us and made themselves right at home. They handed their son a chocolate croissant for him to eat and I thought "oh lord, he is going to get that EVERYWHERE." And he did...luckily he didn't wipe any of it on me though. The mom thought it was hilarious and decided to take about 20 pictures with her cell phone instead of help clean up the mess. Then the lovely couple decided to have a few make-out sessions on the train, which made the room VERY uncomfortable. It was disgusting, I mean come on! Luckily the son didn't like it much either and everytime they started kissing he would say something or get out of his seat to get their attention. Thanks kid! Finally after about 2 hours, and two bathroom breaks of me having to get out of the kids way, they got off the train. It was back to silence! I read a lot more from the tour book I borrowed from Kristin and Ian and took some notes. I tried to sleep a little more, and got a few zzz's in, but mostly just stared out the window at the scenery passing by. Finally at 14:00 (2:00) we pulled into the Praha hiavni nadrazi train station.
Once off the train I tried my hardest to look for a sign saying Taxi, or even a picture of a taxi, but I couldn't find anything. So I got my map out and figured my hotel couldn't be too far, its just the next street. The only problem was I had no idea where it was located on that street, but I decided to chance it anyway. I walked the wrong way down the street until I figured out the numbers were decreasing and not increasing, so I turned around. At the top of the hill was my hotel, I found it! The Golden Tulip Prague Terminus. It is not quite as close to the center as promised on the website, but I got a great deal on a 3 star hotel, so I couldn't complain. I walked up to a very intimidating metal door with spikes and thought, "how the hell am I supposed to open this?" And then in the corner of my eye I saw a little button that said, "push to open." Ah, success, the door opened very quickly and I walked up a short flight of stairs to the reception. I slammed my heavy bag on the floor with a huge sigh of relief and checked in. I hadn't eaten anything since breakfast and quickly asked the women if I could get some food anywhere really quickly. She motioned over to the small snack bar, but I thought, I can find something better later. I went up to my room and opened the door. It is small, but really cozy. It's so cute! A very large bed all for me, TV, mini-bar (I will try to stay away from that) and a huge bathroom. All in all, I'm a happy girl.
I took a little break and laid down for a minute just to decide what I wanted to do about food. I decided to walk the streets and follow one of the walking tours in the book. Very loosely of course, because I did not want to hold the book in my hand the entire time walking in Prague. So I tried to memorize it, but failed miserably. I guess I was distracted by all the pretty lights and shops, not to mention all the really cool buildings. I walked down one of the main streets all the way to the river and once I turned the corner I couldn't believe how beautiful Prague Castle is. It was about 4:30 at this point and the sun had just gone down but the sky was still light, giving the castle a bit of a glow. I think I even said, "Wow" out loud. So I walked down a block to Charles Bridge and did the tourist pictures. Then I walked up the other main street and looked in some shops. My favorite was, Manufaktura, it was full of wooden toys, dyed Easter eggs and lots of other trinkets. The dyed eggs were really cool and I would have bought them, but the thought of transporting real eggs through Europe and home made me cringe. They also had kitchen tools made out of wood and lots of honey objects. Upstairs with the wooden toys they had the coolest wooden puzzles of the different continents. The North America puzzle was really cool and all the states were so tiny. I considered buying it, but I don't really have a need for it. Otherwise there was a framed poster on the wall for the shop saying wooden toys. I actually really liked the framed poster and wanted to ask if they would sell it, but I wouldn't be able to get it home framed so I didn't. I think I should have, it was pretty cool...maybe tomorrow.
I went to a lot of other tourist shops, just to look and the street eventually lead to the Old Town Square with the Astronomical Clock. The square was PACKED, it had a BEAUTIFUL Christmas tree with twinkling lights and a whole Christmas mart set up. People were gathered in front of the clock to watch it strike the hour, which I missed, but oh well. I figured I would have to devote some time to that clock in the daylight because it looks just too confusing. So I wondered through the Christmas mart and watched some Czech dancers on the stage. I decided to try one of the foods everyone was standing in line for, Trdelnik. They roll some sort of doe around a circular object and put it over a fire. The dough becomes a pastry and they roll it in cinnamon. It was delicious! There are stands everywhere, so I will do some research and figure out exactly what it is. I spent some time in the square soaking in all the atmosphere. People were having such a good time and it was a fun area to be in, but it started to rain and I didn't want to be stuck in rain without my umbrella.
I made my way back towards the hotel and stopped at this internet cafe. They assigned me to a desk upstairs on the balcony, and I must say this balcony shakes every once and a while, I think its the metro...a bit scary really. And you can smoke in here, so all the smoke is rising and making my eyes even more tired than they already are. Jeez. :) I am off to find a restaurant with some good food and perhaps walk around a bit more. I am calling it early this evening to get some sleep and plan my day tomorrow. I think I will start early at the Prague Castle. It just looks so pretty, I was immediately drawn to it.
Happy Monday!
Ahoj, Anna
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment