Rosie and The Operator are hitting the streets of Prague bright and early, well, not that early, it is winter and with it being colder in the mornings and the sun rising a little later everything opens a little later too and no one is in a hurry, including us. Snow is forecast for later in the day and we are so excited, fingers crossed!
Wandering around Old Town Prague makes you feel like you have stepped back in time. Prague was officially established in 1091, back then, it was just a crossroads where traders met. The city grew and over time kingdoms were formed, conquered and reformed from this once upon a time cross in the road. Throughout the centuries as the Old Town spread and grew bigger, it has still retained its charm and originality due to being largely untouched during WW2 compared to other European capitals.
Rosie cannot get over how grand, big and tightly packed the buildings are in Old Town Prague. Every one of them feels like they should be something special and noteworthy because they look so extravagant but the majority are just relegated into obscurity as being nothing special when they look so to the contrary.
The large buildings of the Old Town are all different shades of pastels and are all so different in their decoration, making the city look so wealthy and grandly impressive.
Small Square is Rosie’s favorite space and is said to be the oldest inhabited part of Prague with the original homes occupying the same footprint dating back from the year 1000! Over time these grand, original homes evolved and expanded into what you see today with their ‘newly renovated’ facades mainly dating from the 1700s. Can you believe that most still have their original medieval cellars from the 1000s!
The VJ Rott house is also in this square, it seems to be in every photograph of Prague and is so delicately beautiful with a painted floral facade depicting medieval tradespeople. The Rotts renovated this house in 1896 when two brothers started a successful iron working and construction business. The Blue & White Lion building next door is also from the 1800s and has an excellent Gothic doorway dating from the 1300s.
Rosie loves the motifs above the doors of the houses around the Old Town Squares, back in the day most people couldn’t read and write so there were no such thing as street names and numbers. Everyone knew the names of the squares and if you were looking for a certain house, it was defined by the square it was in and the picture above the door.
For example – on the eastern side of the Small Square you will find the House of the Golden Lion.
The House of the Three Black Swans
The House of Two Guys Carrying a Giant Bunch of Grapes…..Rosie so just made up that name, but you get the jist, cool eh!
The House at The Minute is another eye opener, the paintings on the wall and its position near the Astronomical Clock draw your eye immediately. Dating from the 1400s, this house had a full makeover in 1564 with a third floor added and these beautiful white etchings on the black facade added.
They are scenes from the bible, Roman mythology and also show the Hapsburg rulers of the day. This house has taken on many roles through the ages such as a pharmacy up until 1712 and also a tobacco shop, hence the name At The Minute. The name is not a measure of time but refers to the very small packs of tobacco sold there, minute…as in small. The house was also briefly the childhood home of the famed writer Franz Kafka
The Storch House is another pretty medieval abode with a cute Juliette balcony. The beautiful facade paintings were added by the owner of this bookstore, Alexander Storch in 1895.
The murals are broken into three sections – the bottom showing scientific and astronomical study. The middle has the Prague Coat of Arms squeezed between four windows and the top mural shows Saint Wenceslas, Patron of Bohemia riding his white horse whilst ‘being given the grace of god’.
Next door, not to be outdone, the neighbors claim to fame is that Albert Einstein often played his violin and gave lectures there whilst he was working as a professor at the Prague University from 1911-1912….there you go.
In amongst the wooden huts of the Old Town Square Christmas Market and framed by a beautiful row of townhouses stands the huge bronze statue of Jan Hus. A religious leader who butted heads with the Vatican in the 1350s and started the Protestant movement in Prague. He was later burnt at the stake as a heretic and then revered again as a martyr hence the statue 500 years later.
One of the stand out buildings in The Old Town Square is the fairy tale castle spires of Our Lady Before Tyn Church. This church takes a backseat behind a row of beautifully coloured townhouses, where it is an iconic image in Prague. But where on earth is the churches front door? Surely a church of this stature and beauty would be standing in its own square for all to behold?
Rosie and The Operator walked around and around the church, we passed through other small squares never getting any closer, only seeing the spires peeping out over the tops of buildings, it was bizarre, how we could not find the front door to the biggest building in the area.
We must be getting close, the picture below shows a side door….it was locked….and it was a dead end alley….we couldn’t get to the front of the building!
Rosie was getting a little grumpy with The Operator for his poor navigation and his crazy notion that there is no majestic front door….well, The Operator was right.
This beautiful church has no frontage to marvel at other than the soaring towers…those town houses are built onto the front of the church…you walk down a small arched alleyway that leads you to a small door where you enter the church, no fanfare, no awe inspiring upward gazes of beauty, just a door down the end of a dark alley. Rosie has never seen anything like it ever and was a little disappointed…The inside of the church, was not so disappointing, only the sign that said no photos. Rosie reverently didn’t take any, until she saw everyone else doing so and went blythly ahead firing away herself.
There has always been a church here since the 1100s, this embodiment of the church dates back to the 1300s and took over 300 years to build!
Here is the Powder Tower, from last night. In the daylight, it is still very dark, carbon covered and ominous but you can better make out the beautiful details of the decoration on it. The sun hitting the bright gold ornamentation that the statues of the saints hold is especially beautiful.
As we were in the area of the Republic Square Christmas Market we visited last night….we just had to call in for a mid morning cup of steaming honey wine. We were not the only ones indulging, our chap had quite a que happening.
The Christmas Markets look so different in the daytime, still festive and welcoming in the chill winter air, but with out the darkness and twinkling lights….a little less magical.
We wandered down towards the Vlatva River that runs through the middle of the city heading towards the most famous and oldest of all the bridges in Prague, the Charles Bridge.
The sky was clear and the air was cold, it hadn’t warmed up at all and everyone was huddled in their scarves. The trees that lined the river had a few leaves still clinging to their branches and their reddish branch tips looked as cold as Rosie’s fingertips were. Reaching the river bank, there across the road was Prague castle high on the hill and the rest of the Old Town tumbling down, orange roofed from it. The water of the river was dark and fast flowing. Groins in the river made for great photo taking with our destination, The Charles Bridge in the background.
What the heck are those said The Operator? About half a dozen humpy back, long hair and tailed marsupial like rodents were swimming in the river water below, or perched on the groins that stuck out of the river.
Rosie thought they looked like a cuter version of a rat….she hoped they were not rats, cause they were big….big cat sized big….The Operator did a search on the WWW and came up with a muskrat…cant confirm or deny….but it does sound better, and they do look cuter than just a plain old rat.
The weak winter sun was making a glorious show in its final hours, we stopped at a terrace café/bar area on the waterfront with sweeping views up and down the river. The outdoor terrace was lively, seats were lined with thick sheepskins and blankets were provided to put over your knees. People sat around with steaming mugs of mulled wine or hot drinks and reveled in the location and view wrapped up in fleeces, hats and scarves.
We passed through the tall blackened stone gate and stepped onto the famed Charles Bridge, this was where everyone in town wanted to be and the volume of people was a bit overwhelming.
The bridge itself is 610 meters long by 10 meters wide so we linked arms and leisurely zigged and zagged from side to side avoiding selfie sticks and photo takers whilst Rosie paused now and then and took a few shots too.
We stopped to admire the original art of the various artists that display along the bridge and stopped to take a few snaps of the 30 statues, mostly of saints, that sit on the balustrades of the bridge peering down piously on passersby. Their bodies blackened from time and pollution over the 400 years that they have been sitting there. The sun was starting to get low in the sky and they were turning into beautiful silhouettes against the frosty river and blush of sunset.
It was just momentous being on this ancient bridge built in 1357, the oldest of the 17 that span the river in the city.
From the middle, the bridge starts slopping slightly downhill and we walked through the bridge gate on the opposite side of the river into the Mala Strana ( Lesser Town/Little Side). What a beautiful scene before us, the street was resplendent in the evening glow, showing off the multicolored houses against the dark brick of the tower and the gate.
We climbed the Bridge tower for an awesome sunset view over the orange rooftops of Prague with Prague castle sitting to the right and St Nicolas Church to the left.
Walking back home over the Charles Bridge, just taking our time clutching a steaming cup of mulled wine was awesome. A tourist was standing by the rail throwing bread into the air for the swooping gulls to catch and the river had turned pastel with the distant bridges a pale blue.
Even though the bridge was more crowded than ever, standing there looking out over the city Rosie and The Operator felt like they were the only ones there.
Tomorrow we are off to visit Prague Castle – the UNESCO site that boasts to be the Largest Castle Complex in the World. Please join us!
