The flight from Dulles to Frankfurt left about a half hour late and got in about 20 minutes late. Instead of coming to a gate, the plane parked at a remote area and we boarded a bus to go to the terminal. I had a two-hour layover, so I did have enough time to get to the connecting flight to Prague, but it was a long trek, as the airport at Frankfurt is just huge.
Once in Prague, I got some Czech money (koruna) from the ATM. Here is what it looks like. The current exchange rate is about 20 Čkr to a dollar, so the amount you see here is about US$15. (Sorry, the bills wouldn’t lie totally flat.)
I then took a bus from the airport to the subway stop at Zličin.From there it was a straight shot in to Anděl, the stop nearest the hotel. I wandered around for about 15 minutes in -3°C (26°F) weather before finding the hotel. The room is really quite nice. The view from the window is a good news–bad news situation. The bad news is that it’s ugly. The good news is the room is at the back of the building away from the street noise. Anyway, I don’t intend to spend a lot of time in Prague staring out the hotel room window. Also, the area around the hotel isn’t exactly a thing of beauty; the Smichov district is an industrial area.
However, just about a block from the hotel is Čokoládová Cukrárna (Chocolate Patisserie). More about it later.
I then headed out to buy some toothpaste and shaving cream, and to do some sightseeing, as it was only 11 a.m. and I had plenty of daylight. I bought the items at the Tesco hypermarket in the Nový Smichov shopping center.
I then headed up Stefánikova (which turns into Újezd) towards the Charles Bridge. Here are some of the things I saw on the way.
At one point, I passed the Memorial to the Victims of Communism. This is near Petřin Hill, but I did not know it at the time, or I would have climbed to the top to get some pictures.
More scenes from my walk.
The Charles Bridge (Karlův most) is pretty much beset by tourists, including me, and you have probably seen many pictures of it if you have seen pictures of Prague. So here are some typical tourist-y photos.
On the way back to the hotel, I stopped at La Bastille, which, despite its name, is not a French restaurant. I had the goulash with bacon dumplings, and it really hit the spot.
Finally, I bought some cake at the Čokoládová Cukrárna (sorry, no pictures of that). And that completed day one in Prague.
I saw this one in the Frankfurt airport. The main text translates to: “Everyone who flies here can buy at a good price.” The bird is saying something like “Even someone who is flitting here and back.”
There were posters everywhere for Karel Schwarzenberg, one of the candidates in the runoff presidential elections scheduled for later this month. The field in the first round included Vladimír Franz, an artist and university professor who is very heavily tattooed. Talk about your fringe candidate.
There’s a game parlor near the hotel that has a creepy cardboard cutout in front of it.
It would appear that “Fifty Shades of Grey” is a really international phenomenon.
Speaking of bookstores, here is one called “Our Army”. The strange part is that if you look at the books in the display window, they aren’t all military books; some are children’s books.
