Prague in a Day!

What an awesome day!  It was an off day for the tournament so Ludmila organized a trip to Prague for us.  We woke up early and caught an 8:30 bus to a train station about an hour away.  From there, we boarded a train to Prague.  The trip was about 3 hours but the train was very comfortable.  We had little cabins that held 6 people each.  The cabins had wi-fi and they served free coffee and tea during the trip.  I was in need of some caffeine so I asked if they had coca cola light.  Our server spoke great english and told me that they did not but they did have the Czech version, Kofola.  She said it sort of tasted like coke so I said why not, I'd give it a try.  Well it definitely didn't taste like coke, that is for sure! I let everyone try it and the consensus was it tasted like iced tea with ginger.  Needless to say, it did not satisfy my urge for a soda!  

We finally arrived in the main railway station of Prague at about 12:30 and immediately hopped on the Subway to head towards the Prague Castle.   The Prague Castle is one of the oldest buildings in Prague, built in the 9th century.  It was huge and absolutely gorgeous.  The detail of the architecture was unbelievable, especially when you think about the fact that there were no power tools when it was built!  In front of the castle, two guards stood at attention, similar to Buckingham Palace in Britain.  Naturally, we all had to stand and take pictures with them.  What an awful job - to have to stand at attention and not move despite all of the annoying tourists taking your picture.  After the castle, we walked to the St. Vitus Cathedral.   It is one of the largest churches in Europe and took over 50 years to build.  Again, the architecture was absolutely beautiful.  Dina and I both said it reminded us a lot of Notre Dame.  Dina, Mary Anne and I were all saying that we just don't have sites like this on our side of the Atlantic.  While we have our own beautiful sites and buildings, they just can't compare to something built over 1000 years ago.  After the cathedral, we continued on to see the Royal Palace.  It was another beautiful building but I think the best part of this one was the view of the city.  Prague is built up on a hill and the palace sits at the top so you were able to look down and see almost the entire city.  Despite the rainy, cloudy weather the view was still great - I can only imagine what it would be like on a bright sunny day.  We then started down the hill towards the Charles Bridge and Old Prague.  The Charles Bridge is on every "must see" list for Prague.  It is a huge pedestrian walkway with beautiful sculptures and a great view of both Old Prague and New Prague.  Despite the weather, there were lots of artists out selling their work and tons of tourists.  We crossed the bridge and then visited the Old Town Square.  It is a huge square in the center of Prague with lots of coffee shops and restaurants.  Also in Old Town Square was the Town Hall and Astronomical Clock.  At this point we all split up for a bit to explore, shop and eat.  Mary Anne, Stephanie and I decided to go to the Church of St. Nicholas but when we got there we found out it was closed for the afternoon. We moved on to Plan B, which was go to the top of the Town Hall to check out the view of the square.  One thing I've learned from my other travels in Europe is if you have the opportunity to go up to the top of a building you should do so, the view is usually worth it.  This was exactly the case here - the view from the top was gorgeous.  After taking a ton of pictures, we went over to take the elevator down.  This was a little bit of an adventure as Stephanie and I discovered that Czech elevators do not have safety sensors that don't allow the door to close if a body part is in the way.  Stephanie and I both almost lost an arm because of it!  We made it out unscathed and caught up with the rest of the group.  

The next stop on our tour of Prague was going to be Jaromir Jagr's bar.  I was pretty excited about this, especially now that he is a Flyer!  On the way we stopped in to a little hockey shop.  We were hoping to find some Czech hockey merchandise - unfortunately the tournament is not selling anything other than programs or pucks.  A few people picked up hats but other than that there wasn't much to pick from.  After our little detour, we walked through this huge pedestrian area where Ludmila thought the bar was but it turns out it has been closed for a year!  We were a little disappointed but everything worked out, there were a ton of restaurants and street vendors around so we had plenty to choose from.  We eventually found a little Italian restaurant and sat down for a bite to eat.  After all of the walking we had done it felt great to sit for a bit.  We ate (and I finally had my diet soda) then headed back to the train station to catch the train back to Zlin.  We were able to see so much in one day, mostly because we were with someone that knew the city.  There was no time wasted trying to figure out what we wanted to see then how to get there; Ludmila

We have to get up early tomorrow morning and finish up our testing as well as have our group photo taken.  Then Dina and I are off to Prerov for the entire day.  We are both standbys for the first game (game 2 of the relegation round between Switzerland and Russia) and she is standby for the 5th/6th place game (Czech vs Finland) and I am goal judging.  In Zlin the semifinals are taking place - the US is playing Germany and Canada is playing Sweden.  I don't expect either game to be very close but you never know, maybe the Germans or Swedes will surprise us.  We will find out the assignments for the medal games tomorrow night.  Dina and I are both hoping we get to work but we shall see.  Keep your fingers crossed for us!  Goodnight all!