Judith's blog

We picked up a couple of leaflets for walking tours, but were spoiled for choice. There were communist, medieval, history, alternative history, ghost tours, etc. The list seemed endless. In the end we plumped for a general history/most important sites four hour tour. As the tour didn’t start until 11am, we decided to go to the Communism museum, which was fascinating. As elsewhere, the ideals of communism quickly turned into state repression, and people of Geoff’s age will remember the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Warsaw pact forces. The museum looks at this and the aftermath, including the eventual Velvet Revolution which eventually saw the overthrow of the pro-Soviet government in 1989, at around the same time as other countries under Soviet control were also gaining independence.

Whilst there we found yet more info on tours and this time found a free one, so decided to go on it instead of the fee paying one. In the event, we were the only two on it, so we had a private show of Prague with a nice young American woman called Emily. Because it was just the three of us, we did it at our pace and got to ask endless questions and get inside info on sights, venues, what it’s like to live in Prague, etc. She took us across the Charles bridge into the lesser town and up and around the castle.

After the tour we went in search of the Opera House and this whacky modern building in the middle of the art noveau district. We were going to hire a pedalo and go cruising on the river, but the wind had picked up so much that some people were having trouble steering and it looked like river boat dodgems. Having laughed at the people in the boats, we declined to provide the entertainment in turn, so went in search of beer instead.

I love finding local places off the beaten tourist track and we stumbled across a small entrance with just a small price list written entirely in Czech. From the measures it was clear what was beer and at £1 a pint, we went in. Behind the doorway was a lovely beer garden and restaurant. We were the only non-Czech people there and muddled through – despite at one point getting coffee instead of pickled cheese. They served the Prague version of tapas and we ate home smoked pork belly, pickled cheese and pepper fish pot. Delicious. It was a lovely place to spend the evening and they had to chuck us out in the end.

See photos of today.

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