This past weekend in Prague was amazing! I loved it!
We had some drama arriving. Before leaving we realized that the Italians were striking on Thursday at 9pm for 24 hours. Personally, I think the Italians should just have one day a year set aside to appreciate the train workers so then maybe they stop striking every other week. It's the behavior of a whiny toddler who wants attention. We get it people. Anyway. We outsmarted the messed up schedule by taking a train Friday morning during rush hour (they can't cancel those apparently) and spent the day in Milan.
Milan was cool. We saw the Duomo there and we saw the palms being delivered for Palm Sunday!! That was my favorite part. No one else I was with was as enthused but hey, palms are cool. After the duomo and the museum that they built for it, we had gelato and went to the airport.
We had some drama arriving. Before leaving we realized that the Italians were striking on Thursday at 9pm for 24 hours. Personally, I think the Italians should just have one day a year set aside to appreciate the train workers so then maybe they stop striking every other week. It's the behavior of a whiny toddler who wants attention. We get it people. Anyway. We outsmarted the messed up schedule by taking a train Friday morning during rush hour (they can't cancel those apparently) and spent the day in Milan.
Milan was cool. We saw the Duomo there and we saw the palms being delivered for Palm Sunday!! That was my favorite part. No one else I was with was as enthused but hey, palms are cool. After the duomo and the museum that they built for it, we had gelato and went to the airport.
Our flight to Prague was uneventful (yay), and we called an uber to take us to our Airbnb. The guy who picked us up was maybe 17, a cutie, and the young cutie parked in a no-parking zone and got a ticket while picking us up. Dumb cutie, or, as my southern friends and family say, bless his heart. Poor guy.
Anywho. Our dinner on Friday night was delicious! They had live music and scrumptious food. It's hard to continue to come up with new, positive adjectives to describe all the food I eat. Hard life, I know. My friends decided to order dessert and eat until "we hate ourselves." It was a good night.
Anywho. Our dinner on Friday night was delicious! They had live music and scrumptious food. It's hard to continue to come up with new, positive adjectives to describe all the food I eat. Hard life, I know. My friends decided to order dessert and eat until "we hate ourselves." It was a good night.
Saturday was one of my favorite days of this entire European adventure. We began the day by walking to Old Town to see the cuckoo clock on the astronomical clock go off at 10am. It wasn't anything special but it was something to see.
We walked around the Easter markets and ate a huge crepe breakfast. I did not finish it. It would've been really fun to keep track of how many meals I actually finish throughout this trip- it's not many. While eating breakfast, several Segway guys came up to us trying to sell us on a Segway tour. We all got to try the Segway out for about a minute. I was into the idea of a Segway tour before I tried it. It was kinda tricky to balance!! It's like standing on a wii balance board, but it's real life so you could fall instead of just watching your wii mii crash and tumble. We told the Segway guys we'd think about it and come back later.
We headed towards the castle and cathedral for the changing of the guards. We saw the guards change and the band play. This little tradition is very similar across counties from what I've seen- keep in mind that's not much on account of I'm 5'2". I was very unimpressed with the Czechs horn angles, but, then again, theirs were the only horn angles I actually managed to see. They sounded good, though.
At the palace, I stood in a fake post pretending to be a guard. It was cool. Also I got a picture with a guard. I apologized first. He didn't smile. So I didn't smile when I was pretending to be a guard. Throwback to my days on the drum line when the boys wouldn't let me smile.
We had lunch on a boat afterwards! It was so cool! They had comfy chairs with cushions and blankets! I was very pleased. Also, I ate ravioli with chicken meatballs instead of eating spaghetti carbonara for the 9th time in two months.
After lunch, we went back to the square. We ended up doing a Segway tour. I was real nervous. Once we got to the place, I perked up because I realized they gave us helmets. That made me feel better. Then, I saw a pink helmet. I called dibs on that thing. I looked like a pro and adorable. It was great. I was very nervous about Segwaying. I decided it should be a verb. I slowly got the hang of it. Tony, our tour guide, was very patient with me. We got a little lesson before we left and then we were off! He made us go up and down little stairs on the Segways! Also, we had to cross streets and be very close to people. Bad idea people. I did have a bell, though I didn't want to move my hand off the grip to actually ring it. The struggle was real. I had trouble stopping at this one point. Well two actually, but we'll get to that in a minute. We had just crossed the street and it was kind of a downhill and I couldn't stop so I just did a big loop around the statue. Tony shook his head at me. He should've known then. Zac knew then...
Tony took us all over the city. We stopped near St. Charles Bridge for a group shot, rolled by the John Lennon Wall, and saw the peeing statue. Despite my usual displeasure with that type of humor, I cracked up when we rolled up. It was funny. On our way back was the second time I had issues with the stopping concept. You're supposed to just stand up straight, but my feet had inched close to the top of the board thing, so standing up didn't put enough pressure on the back to stop the Segway. I ended up screaming and rolling into a curb and jumped off over the handle bars. It was hilarious. Both the Segway and I are fine. We made it back to the shop safely, and I happily returned the Segway to the dudes. I'll need more practice before I join a Segway gang. It was so fun though. Highly recommended.
Tony took us all over the city. We stopped near St. Charles Bridge for a group shot, rolled by the John Lennon Wall, and saw the peeing statue. Despite my usual displeasure with that type of humor, I cracked up when we rolled up. It was funny. On our way back was the second time I had issues with the stopping concept. You're supposed to just stand up straight, but my feet had inched close to the top of the board thing, so standing up didn't put enough pressure on the back to stop the Segway. I ended up screaming and rolling into a curb and jumped off over the handle bars. It was hilarious. Both the Segway and I are fine. We made it back to the shop safely, and I happily returned the Segway to the dudes. I'll need more practice before I join a Segway gang. It was so fun though. Highly recommended.
After the Segways, we planned to go back and hang out at the Airbnb for a bit. On our way back we kept noticing Thai massage places. I said something like, "Oh yeah! That's a big deal here. It was number five on the list of 50 things to do in Prague." So Michael and I ended up getting Thai massages! It was painful! I survived. No worries.
We arrived back at the Airbnb only to realize we needed to hustle to the astronomical clock tower if we wanted to be there for sunset. So, in the words of a middle school choir director, we "moved like we stole something." We sort of made it for sunset. It was more dusk. The pictures turned out lovely, anyway.
After the crazy day, we had burgers for dinner and I got to FaceTime Mom, Poppop, Granny, and Aunt Diane, which was quite fun. They found my stories amusing so I was happy. I told Granny that when I come home, I'm coming over for her French toast because it's still the best. Poppop is excited. It'll be great.
Palm Sunday morning I woke up sad because I think that was the only Palm Sunday I didn't get a Palm. So sad. We went to actually walk across the St. Charles Bridge. It was cool.
After that, we went to the John Lennon wall to take our time and take more pictures. It's a very popular wall. We had to wait in line for the "Love" and the door shot. Worth the wait.
Our last thing to do in Prague was to eat a chimney cake. You might know it from Facebook. It went viral a few weeks ago. I was very excited to try it. It's a pastry with cinnamon and sugar and there's ice cream in the middle. I think I would've enjoyed it more if it hadn't been 11am. It was good, though.
All in all, it was another wonderful weekend. Only one more left!
All for now,
Swiss Miss
All for now,
Swiss Miss