Day Eight: Bohemian Rhapsody

Princess:  Today I woke up and played in my new hotel.  We had apples and crackers with nutella.  We walked in the rain and my feet hurt.  I got a puppet.  I ate tomatoes and mozzarella.

Monkey Hat:  Today, I woke up third and started reading my book. I read 1 hour and 30 minutes and then woke Princess up.  Princess and I had breakfast. It was apple slices with crackers and nutella, yoghurt, and milk.  We left and went to the Prague Castle in the rain.  We bought an umbrella that was blue.  In the castle we saw the royal palace, St. George Basilica, and St. Vitus Cathedral.  Because Princess got wet, we went back to the hotel.  At the hotel and we watched a little TV.  Then we went to the restaurant that we went to yesterday.  Next we went back to the hotel for a little.  My family and I left and went to go to the Charles Bridge.  On the way, we bought a puppet.  We crossed the bridge and went back home in the metro.  When we went to the hotel, we watched TV and left to eat at Mona Lisa.  Mom bought us ice cream and then went back to the hotel.

Mother Superior: We were stuck out in the rain following a medieval wall up to the Prague Castle.  With no end in sight to the rain, we took cover under our umbrellas until we reached the castle.  Unfortunately, I had made a wardrobe miscalculation.  Not realizing it would down pour, I dressed Princess in a cute brown dress, stockings, and suede boots; an error of monumental proportions.  When we entered the Castle, I tried to dry her feet and stockings with paper towels.  Didn’t work and Captain Grumpy ended up carrying Princess through the rest of the grounds. St Vitus Cathedral was overwhelming.  There were tourists everywhere and nowhere to take respite.  Unable to sit down and reflect on the opulence around us, we decided to return to the hotel, dry off, and regroup for the afternoon. 

Re-energized by our almuerzo and short siesta, we headed out to the Charles Bridge.  First order of business was to purchase the first souvenir of our trip.  We were lured into a shop that was playing Enrique Iglesias and had marionettes of the FC Barcelona team.  I told the shop keeper that we preferred Real Madrid.  The kids loved the puppets and after 20 minutes of indecision, we settled on a Pinocchio so all of the kids could use it during their shows.  My guess is that their show will premier on Easter Sunday.  Anyhow, we finally joined the precession of endless troupes of tourists to cross Charles River.  A quarter of the way across, Princess began to boogie to the tunes being belted out by the Bridge Band.  Moved by the melody, we rubbed the bronze Lorraine Cross that the Dalai Lama supposedly identified as the center of the universe during his visit to Prague.  For good luck and a chance to return to Praha care of St John Nepomuk, we rubbed the right and left side of his monument.  Overwhelmed by the tragic sentiment of life that had led to St John Nepomuk being sacked and dropped into the Vltava River, we headed to the Franz Hafka Museum.  The best part of the collection were the two bronze statues that are urinating at the entrance.  You are encouraged to grab them and help redirect them.  The temperatures dropped again so we found a little café and warmed up with a round of rich hot chocolates with a touch of Bailey’s for the adults.  Despite our best efforts, we were unable to pin down the exact day.  A few moments later, we decided to retreat for the day.  We located the nearest metro that delivered us within 3 blocks of our hotel. Dobry vecer…

Captain Grumpy:  What miserable weather, at least in the morning.  It was wet and cold.  We had to buy an umbrella, because it rained so hard, I was afraid Monkey Hat, despite having a monkey hat, would get soaked and sick.  We walked 600 meters up a hill to the Prague Castle in the rain.  There weren’t many options in that regard.  The metro takes you as close as you can get before having to walk.  A street trolley could take you one block closer I suppose.  To everyone’s credit, nobody complained.  A taxi may have gotten us even closer had we went that option.  We were soaking wet even with the umbrellas. On top of the rain, the temperature continued to drop.  We even saw a little bit of wet snow coming down (later this was confirmed by a car driving through the city with snow on it).  In the castle, we saw the crowns and scepters of past Bohemian Rulers.  There were so brilliant, the jewels looked like candy.   I carried Princess back to the hotel because her feet were wet.  We changed her stockings and shoes and grabbed some lunch at the trusty Italian restaurant across the street.  We then took back off to see the sights.  Luckily, it had stopped raining by then, but the temperature had dropped a little more.  After getting off at the wrong subway stop, we corrected our course and arrived at the Charles Bridge.  This probably the tourist center of Prague.  We weren’t real sure at when it was built, but we do know that it was closed for repairs around 980 AD, and has a lot of history involving wars and murders.  We rubbed St John’s sculpture for safety crossing bridges…(he is the patron saint for safely crossing bridges and the wrongly accused)…and continued across.  On the other side, we decided to go to the Kafka museum.  He is probably the best known Czech, along with King Wenceslas of Christmas Carole fame.  We walked around this part of the city, where John Lennon’s Wall, St Nicholas Church, Parliament and several embassies are located before heading back to the hotel and dinner.