Good morning to you in the States... in the beautiful state of Montana it is currently 7:08 am as I am writing, but in the wonderful city of Vienna it is 3:08 pm. I am sitting in the kitchen of my apartment drinking coffee and eating a banana. :)
Prague!!
Bridget and I left for Prague at 9:45 am on Saturday. The Student Agency bus system that we went through is really confusing. You would think that you would have to go some where and pick up your tickets... but no... you print them off from your email, and show your electronic ticket along with your passport to the bus guide. There also is no bus station for this company in Vienna. We waited at a bus stop instead, that was also hard to find. It was hard due to the confusion. But, the bus ride there was about five hours. I also thought that you would have to get your passport stamped when you came into the country, but we were told that there are no boundaries between Czech Republic and Austria. Any way...
The bus arrived at the station in Prague at 2:30 pm. We met a guy from Georgia who needed help calling his friends, who kind of left him hanging. Hopefully he made it okay! Before I knew it, my friend Adela and her boyfriend Marcel were there to meet us! She has been the friend that I have been writing about a lot, who I was so excited to see, and Bridget has been hearing about her for a while... hopefully she didn't get sick of it. :P It was so good to see her! Seven years later. :) Marcel owns a car, so he drove us to her apartment to drop off our stuff and the girls went site seeing around the city. I will try to make a separate post just of pictures from Prague, and other pictures from the trip. The photo up loader is being a little strange right now, so I'll see what happens.
We saw the out side of a museum... I think it was the Natural History Museum... I don't remember, but it is in the center of town with a beautiful fountain in front of it. (Sorry, I horrible with names.) We exchanged our euros for korunas. To put in into perspective for you, I just looked it up and 1 US dollar is equal to 20.80 Czech koruna. 1 euro is equal to 25.73 Czech koruna. To make it even more confusing, 1 US dollar is equal to .81 euro. So, with the koruna being worth more for the American dollar, shopping was cheaper there than it is in Vienna. It was just weird because 200 or so koruna, isn't very much in American dollars, even though it seems like a lot. They had a market with food, toys, jewelery, pottery... any thing you could think of. It was so much fun, and a lot nicer than the market in Vienna. In Vienna, people are selling their personal items to make money, and some hand made art, but in Prague, it was mostly hand made items. Adela took us to a small cafe that served Czech deserts. She said that a famous Czech desert is Apple Strudel, much like in Austria, but it tastes a little different. I had a piece of cake was white and regular chocolate. Yum yum!!!
We walked around a lot just to take in the beauty of the city. Don't get me wrong, Vienna is beautiful, but Prague was breath taking! We walked along the river and saw ferry boats, and the sun was setting by the bridge... it was gorgeous! Art was being sold through out the city... same pictures, different people selling them, but still great paintings. I bought four different small paintings, one was 30 koruna, and the other 3 were 50 koruna a piece. You do the math. ;)
If you are a music major in the city, you can't leave with out seeing a concert. We saw a concert with Flute, Organ, and Mezzo soprano. 3 very accomplished musicians. I have never heard of any of them, but their biographies were really impressive. The Mezzo soprano's tone was haunting and beautiful. She sang Ave Maria... and in a beautiful church... I can't express to you how stunning that was. The organ was placed above the sanctuary of the church where most of the pieces were performed. The flutist's tone was beautiful as well, it couldn't have been a better combination. For those of you who came to my recital, you know I did a flute and organ duet, so having performed that recently, it was really neat to see it in Prague. After the concert was over, and most of the people cleared out, Bridget was taking pictures, and I had to take time to kneel in one of the church pews just to take it in and feel God's presence. It was so beautiful... I cried because of the beauty of the church, and the music. It was overwhelming in a good way. I still get a little teary eyed just thinking about it. Adela didn't come to the concert, so we met up with her and Marcel after ward and walked across the bridge. Once again... beautiful! Everything we saw was just amazing. I stopped so many times to get pictures, so it took a long time to get anywhere... ah to be a tourist! :) Adela and Marcel took us to a bar/restaurant and shared 2 bottles of whine. Two small glasses was a bit much for me. I slept really well when we got back to their apartment. :)
All of us slept in the next morning. According to Bridget, when she woke up at 6 am I was snoring. :) Marcel drove us up to a restaurant for lunch in the country side of Prague. The meal was grilled chicken and pork. I know... sounds really American, but it was still really good. :)The next stop was a 14th century castle to go on a tour. We couldn't take any pictures of the inside, but I got some great shots of the out side. Some of the decor and the items in the castle were original, but most of it was redone. In a glass case, games that the castle workers played were on display. After the tour we walked down the other side of the castle and did a little shopping, and returned to the city. Marcel dropped us off by the university housing, where we walked to a rose garden, and later to a tower. The price to walk up to the top of the tower was 50 koruna, but it was worth it! A great view of the entire city. :) Adela took us to another castle, in an older part of the city. It was closed off by walls, and there were several shops and cafes along the way. When we got to the gate, the castle guards were changing shifts. They are a lot like the guards that you would see in London, but dressed a little differently. They did an entire marching sequence to change places. Their shifts are two hours long, and they had to stay absolutely still, they can only move their eyes. They are not allowed to smile either.
It was a great day, walking around the city, taking pictures, and talking to Adela, but I was very tired at the end of the day. Adela made us dinner before we left, and took us to meet the bus at midnight. We left Prague at 12:30 am, and got back to Vienna around 5:30 am. It was a pretty nice ride. The bus had leather seats, so it was quite comfortable. I couldn't fall asleep, so I stayed up almost the entire time reading, and I watched the movie they provided. Hot drinks were served for free, so I had two small cups of hot chocolate. Bridget and I got back to our apartment, and crashed. We made a view calls on skype, and slept until we had to leave for class. We thought that we had our Viennese Composers class at 11, so alarms were set to get up in time. We both didn't wake up until 10:30, the time we should have been out the door to get on the underground train to make it in time. We didn't have schedule for the week, but when we got there, it turned out we didn't have class. I was a bit relieved because that meant I wasn't late for anything! :)
There you go, my week end in Prague. It went by really fast, and it wasn't a lot of time, but I'm so glad I got to go! :) I hope to come back in the future. :) Adela wants to come to Missoula some time soon. I told her about everything you can do there. So, maybe some of you in the area can meet her some day. :)
My time in Vienna is running out! I only have 12 days left. 12 days!! There are a few things that I still want to do, and I hope I get to do all of them. On a free day, I plan to wonder around the city, and just take pictures. There is a really great garden with a Mozart monument and treble clefs made out of flowers. I also want to bike along the Danube River, or even take a long walk. Either way, it will be great. If it gets warmer, I would like to sit out side, and sketch different places in the city. That is my goal, along with home work, and getting my blog going for my Viennese Composers class.
I heard the weather in Montana has been really crazy. I talked to my Dad last night, I called him to wish him a happy fathers day, and he said that it has been raining a lot at home. Tornadoes struck Billings, and a couple of the other places. It snowed in Bozeman a little while ago as well. Wow! Well, I hope you are all safe and enjoying what you can of the weather, where ever you are. Have a great day, and thanks for reading! Oh, and Happy Fathers Day to all of you Dad's out there!!!! See you soon!!! :-)
Love always,
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