Today we did the Prague Castle. Now that we are old hands at the trams we even figured out how to transfer between them and cut down the walking a little bit. We went first to the Castle and toured the four main sites which include St. Vitus Cathedral, the Royal Palace, St. George's Basilica and "the Golden Lane." The Cathedral was magnificent with some breathtaking stained glass and plenty of baroque paintings, statues, ornate tombs of bishops, a beautiful chapel of St. Wenceslas,tombs of Bohemian kings and queens and the like. I loved the stained glass window done by the artist Alphonse Mucha. There was also a beautiful, huge Christmas display of Bethlehem with figures depicting Bethlehem at the time of Christ's birth. All the buildings and figures in the display are carved from bread! The "snow" on the trees is confectioner's sugar! I've included a picture of it - amazing to look at how detailed the figures and buildings are. When I first looked at it I assumed it was wood,until I saw the explanatory sign. Then looking closely you can see how they've taken loaves of bread and carved them up into this enormous mini-village! The chapel for St. Wenceslas is really beautiful too and I was lucky that it was not really crowded when I was passing through so I was able to actually see it, which I gather does not always happen. After the cathedral we did the Royal Palace, which the Czech governments throughout its long history ruled the country and conducted legislative business. Then we went through St. George's basilica, which was refreshingly simple after all the baroque style we've been seeing so far. On our way from there to the Golden Lane, a small little medieval lane within the castle complex where goldsmiths and guards and others who used to work for the castle lived on the grounds, we stopped for hot beverages (mulled wine in my case) just to thaw out. Even though the temperature is mild (low 40s) we were freezing as none of the buildings in the castle are heated and after walking around for several hours we were very cold. We walked through the Golden Lane and saw the little bitty "house" where Franz Kafka wrote several of his books and then we left the castle. We walked down into the Little Quarter where we found a place for lunch - hot soup and beer - to warm up and rest a bit. After lunch we stopped in to see the statue of the famous Infant of Prague in St. Mary the Victorious Church. There was a mass going on at the time, but that didn't stop anyone from visiting the statue. We then went up to the museum where they have all the many ornate outfits that have been given by dignitaries and heads of state to the church for the Infant statue. They were amazing to see and they come from all over the world. Oddly enough, today the Infant was not wearing any of the fancy garb! Pilgrims from all over the world come to pray at this site and there were plenty of them there today. The church sells all kinds of Infant of Prague religious kitsch - replicas of the statue, rosaries, medals, the whole works! After we left there we wandered over to St. Nicholas church, but it had just closed, however we learned that there was to be a concert in there at 5 so we bought tickets and attended the concert. It was a great program - organ, a flute quartet and a soprano whose voice was spectacular. The concert was only 70 minutes long which was about all we could take because the church isn't heated and so sitting still listening to music was lovely except that we quickly began to be frozen to the bone! The musicians were playing with their coats on! It was a lovely concert with works by Mozart, Bach, Handel and a number of Czech composers, including some really lovely Czech Christmas songs. I was really glad we had stumbled upon the concert. The church of St. Nicholas is a riot of baroque art and architecture with enormous statues of bishops and the fathers of the early church everywhere, a cherubs and angels carved into and onto everything. It has a huge marble pulpit also laden with cherubs and an enormous, gold St. Nicholas over the main altar. After the concert we decided to return to our apartment to warm up a bit and rest before finding somewhere for dinner over in our neighborhood. We wanted to get away from the tourist areas and back into regular neighborhoods which turned out to be a very good call. We had our best meal in Prague at a little place just a few minutes away from our apartment. I had grilled beef fillets with vegetable ratatouille, a large stein of beer, and a delicious dessert of hot apple slices wrapped in cinnamon pastry and dusted with sugar with whipped cream and raspberry sauce for dipping. It was heavenly! The food was really good and I had all that for $20 including tip! So after that long day I am pretty tired. Tomorrow we plan on doing the Jewish quarter.
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