old town

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An old city center unlike any other - Prague

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The previous post in this series is here..

After we said bye to our guide and group, we walked back to the Kafka statue and our hotel with a stop at the clock. There was not a big crowd as it was not on the hour.

We watched the Kafka head do a few turns and walked into the mall. There was an Indian food place in the second floor which had Chai and missi roti’s. So we sampled some stuff there and watched the shoppers.

Then we decided to go back to our room, wash and change and go back to see the clock and Prague by night. As soon as we got ready, we went for dinner at Masala, the Indian restaurant right next to the hotel.

The food was great but it was my mistake not to tell the guy “no sesame seeds”.. They brought me butter naan with sesame seeds. By the time we waited for the new Naan to arrive, things got cold as they got a flurry of customers within a 10 minute window! All said and done, the food was great. We were happy!

We were literally in a small backyard surrounded by high rise buildings.. it was beautiful.. this dinner was actually one of the nicest dinners we had in recent times!

Our walk back through the square. The memories of San twirling around like a little princess in this square are priceless.

There were a lot of captures on this walk. Here are the galleries

portrait format gallery..

a few pano shots of the clouds rolling in

We walked back to see the clock chime and there was hardly any room to stand in that crowd. We watched this “antique clock” do its thing and walked further out towards Charles bridge. The sunset was blurred by clouds and it was getting dark and ominous as there was rain in the forecast. We were both wearing chappals and once it started raining, we made a run back towards our hotel which was a good 20 minutes away.

Here is a tip. Don’t run with chappals on cobble stone streets!

We made it back to our hotel and got some well deserved rest.

A highlight video of this last part..

After this it was going to be a ride to the airport in the morning and fly out to our last destination on the grand tour! We did so much in those two and a half days that it will take me a long time to finish writing about.

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Old world charm that still exists today - Prague

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The previous post in this series is here..

We reached Prague by train late in the night. It was past 11PM. The train station area was desolate. We asked the group of students who were in our coach on where the Uber pickup point was and they said “you can just go to any side of the station and wait near the steps. It is safe!” . So we got an Uber and went to the Michelangelo grand hotel. It was dark and we did not get our bearings and I could not appreciate the place late at night. The two employees smoking right outside the doorway was not a welcome sight. Then we went in and breathed a sigh of relief. There was no smoke smell inside. The folks were nice and gave us water bottles to take to our room. It was time to go and crash.

We woke up in the morning and I realized San had booked an amazing place. It was a top class hotel. There was a desi restaurant right outside the hotel which was a bonus. Apparently we were very close to the Kafka’s head landmark (literally a few hundred feet). Our hotel used to be a TV broadcasting and famous radio station landmark at one point. The hotel itself had a rich history. The roads in this area are all paved with stones from hundreds of years ago. very few roads have car access. We walked to a main road to get an Uber as we had to get to a pickup point. I still don’t remember what we ate for breakfast that day or if we ate anything at all. One thing we did have everywhere was Wagh Bakri instant ginger Chai. I would wake up and make tea and that would keep us going!

We met the rest of the group for our group Viator tour of Prague. It was supposed to be an all day tour which ended in a boat ride. Prague was too beautiful and the day we spent there was magical. It was like being in a real life adult Disneyland ! Most of what we saw was built in the 1300-1400 AD time frame. I just went nuts clicking away. This day has so many photos and videos that everything will be broken into three parts.

Our guide who was an intense man with 30+ years experience as a tour guide and driver for the rich and famous in Prague, took his job very very seriously. He was a school principal and drill master rolled into one. We made friends with everyone in the group. Our morning was a drive in the van to see things while he took the mic and explained things. We got to take photos from the window.. It was a long history lesson.

Then we went to a hilly area to walk around behind the castle. There was an old church with a bell that had a fancy chime. So we stopped there for a few minutes and walked through this old town area. Eventually we cut across the moat that was built for the castle and walked into the castle complex. We got to see the magnificent church from all its sides, see the parliament area, the place where foreign dignitaries visit (he even showed us the steps on which Indira Gandhi walked down) and made our way out for a long walk to the Charles bridge.

We had spent a good 2 1/2 hours in this. The pictures and videos might not do justice to the experience.. so I am just posting them as galleries here.. San became good friends with this world traveler lady in our group.. she had just come from where were planning to go next and was full of tips!

There are more pictures.. lots of them.. for once I am mixing photos of buildings with photos of people. This was the best part of our trip so far. So feels not fair to keep it brief. The sights will stay in my head forever.. especially watching San be a kid again and spin around in her frock like a princess.. that makes me smile even now as I type this!

If you are thinking of a romantic place to go with your spouse for a 25th anniversary.. cut out everything else and just spend three or four days in Prague! Strongly recomended!

After exiting the castle area we were to walk to the Charles bridge.

A video highlight of the tour till this point..

That in the next post..

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A half day to do random things in Zadar

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The previous post in this series is here..

We had spent a nice evening walking around old town and had crashed at 9PM as jet lag hit us hard. We had walked a good 10 miles in the morning through the lag in Plitvice the previous day. 

Our plan was to go cross the bridge and see the new town or city center. Then come back and walk past the parks and churches in Old town before heading out. 

We had breakfast right outside our hotel in the attached restaurant and walked to the newer town. It was just like any other downtown with busy office goers, shoppers in the supermarkets and bakeries, students, tons of them.. after walking a few blocks up and down we came back to the old town and asked the visitor center folks for suggestions.

They said there were two new museums within walking distance. So we went to the Museum of Illusions.

We were the only guests and the ticket was pricey but we had time to kill. We thoroughly enjoyed the place.. a few of the exhibits we did not get at the time.. hindsight being 20/20 now we know how to get the "crawling on the wall" type photos. Another time.. Later we learned that the same museum is there in San Francisco! Zadar is a small place. We had spent an extra 1/2 day than required but it was good to get adjusted to local time zone and relax a bit.

there were tons of other photos.. but posting them here. this is a great place to spend a good 2 hours with family and kids. definitely recommend this as a great time pass! 

After this we decided "no more museums"..and walked through a neighborhood of old town that we had missed the previous day. There was a nice market there where San did some shopping. Those skirts and frocks have never seen daylight after they were bought. Apparently they looked nice at that moment but are not worth wearing in public! The lady at the shop did a good sales job I guess. 

We walked though the square and came back to our hotel.

There was a new Bagel place that had just opened across our hotel. They were out of bagels the previous night. So lunch was fresh bagels and they were really good! Apparently the owner relocated from New York and started a bagel chain in this part of the world. 

Video highlights..

Then we got an Uber to the airport and were off to our next stop..

Copyright © 2012, Sundar Narayanan. All rights reserved.