Last week I had the opportunity to travel with my friend Toni to Prague in the Czech Republic. If you are old enough, you probably remember when the Czech Republic was Czechoslovakia (I certainly do). This change in both name and government happened on January 1, 1993 (during my senior year of high school) when it dissolved peacefully and became two separate states, Czech Republic and Solovakia. It was under communist rule until 1989. The Czech Republic is located in the heart of Central Europe and is bordered by Germany, Austria, Slovakia and Poland.

I had to retrain my brain not to call our destination Czechoslovakia and instead refer to it by its proper name. There are nearly 11 million people in Czech Republic and it is a member of the European Union. Prague, where I spent the bulk of my time, has a little over one million inhabitants. I”ll be honest: I hardly knew anything about Prague or the country for that matter but after seeing photos I knew I wanted to visit. My friend Toni works for Delta and was able to figure out a flight schedule for the two of us that was a whirlwind through the Czech Republic and parts of Germany all over the course of five days. Remember, I live in the Bay Area; Central Europe is 11 hours ahead time zone wise and take about 14+ hours to get to from where I am. So was it worth it? A resounding YES. Prague is an absolute jewel box. I am already scheming with how to get back there!

I’m going to take you through my trip and at the end summarize all of the places we saw so that you can borrow from my itinerary if you are planning to go to Prague.

We actually landed in Munich, Germany because the flight schedule was better for us and then took the train from Munich to Prague.

This train ride was a little over five hours long but allowed me to fully stretch out in a compartment and pass out cold. Like…OUT. I missed seeing all the countryside on the way but I hadn’t slept on the plane over from the US and my body decided I needed sleep more than countryside :). We used Uber (which worked 90% of the time while I was in Europe; the rest of the time we grabbed cabs.) to get from the beautiful Prague station to our hotel, the Art Deco Imperial located in Prague (or Praha) 1.

I decided when I was planning this trip that Prague 1 would be the best district to be located in because it is the medieval heart of the city and where most of what I wanted to see is located. Most of Prague 1 is a UNESCO World Heritage Sight; you know you are going to see some good stuff there! The Art Deco Imperial was PERFECTLY located just a five minute walk from Old Town Square and had so much charm and character. This building is from the 1700’s and has been a hotel since 1914. After an extensive renovation in the early 2000’s it is now restored to it’s former Art Deco beauty. Our room on the third floor looked directly out to the street below and had a giant window seat. I spent a fair amount of time perched up there just looking out at my surroundings, people watching from above.

Another plus: the breakfast downstairs at Cafe Imperial. WOW. See these columns and mosaics? This is original 1914 Art Noveau ceramic tiles. This hotel was such a treasure box of character and detail. The Cafe requires reservations and it was easy to see why. This place was magical.

The rest of the afternoon/evening on our first day was spent walking about five minutes out of our front door to see all of the Old Town Square, Powder Tower, the Astronomical Clock and Municipal Building, dinner in the square while feeling really jet lagged and a bunch of souvenir shopping (Sam requested Russian nesting dolls and I got hima set of the Russian leader/president dolls that are beyond awesome). We noticed while walking around a very strong Russian influence both in language and shops. We also noticed that basically everyone smoked everywhere all of the time. SO MUCH SMOKING. We are used to there being no smoking in restaurants and shops in the US and I have taken it for granted. Here in Prague? Lots of smoking.

Having our hotel so close to the square and all of these beautiful sites made getting back home easy. We slept really good that first night.

The next day was one of only two full days we were going to have in Prague so we needed to make them count. Toni suggested a hop-on-hop-off bus to at least show us a few sites we otherwise may have a tough time getting to and after a yummy breakfast downstairs in the dining room we headed off. The bus was helpful, the weather was absolutely perfect (like 72 degrees and clear blue skies) and we had energy so plusses all around. On this day we visited Prague Castle, which was the first European castle I have ever visited so I was SUPER excited. Prague Castle is believed to have been founded in 888 and is the largest coherent castle complex in the world. Pretty cool, right? It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and contains St. Vitus Cathedral. The line to get in for the cathedral is very long but moves super fast. I timed it: five minute wait and trust me when I tell you the line and cathedral was packed. Be patient; it is worth the wait. St. Vitus Cathedral is the largest and most important church or temple in Prague.

I was blown away by the castle and cathedral. We didn’t see as much of it as we could have had we had more time but seeing the cathedral and some of the grounds was wonderful. You could easily spend half of the day here. While we were waiting for our bus back towards the Charles Bridge we soaked up all of the changing fall leaves (our leaves in California are definintly not changing as quickly as leaves in Prague).

The rest of the day was spent wandering streets, enjoying the views and artisans on the Charles Bridge (this bridge is pedestrian only) shopping, eating, visiting the Klementium (not worth it because they will not let you inside the library OR take photos – false advertising. HOWEVER they DO offer a chance to go to the top of the Astronomical Clock which is a must do), going to the top of the Astronomical Tower and taking one million photos of the Old Town below, more shopping, more eating and finally a sunset cruise down the Vltava River – this was the perfect way to end a busy day.

I STRONGLY recommend going to the top of the Astronomical Tower so that you can see these views for yourself. It was one of my favorite parts of the whole trip. The air was balmy, the sky was completely clear, we weren’t rushed – it was perfect.

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Sunday marked our last full day in Prague and we chose to begin the day at church. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has congregations all over the world including in Prague and we were lucky to be near one that was only seven minutes from our hotel. They had translation units for us but hearing the same hymns and sacrament prayers in Czech was so special. I found that it wasn’t too hard to sound out the words phonetically in my Czech hymn book so I sang the last song in very rough Czech!

We headed over to the other side of the Charles Bridge to check out the famous Lennon Wall and then enjoyed the freshest pasta ever at a cafe at the base of the bridge. The Lennon Wall is filled with anti-war, pro-peace and John Lennon quotes/appreciation graffiti and is a must see if you are in Prague.

After lunch we happened upon St. Nicholas Church in the Lesser Town which is considered the most famous Baroque church in Prague.

You have to pay to go inside but I thought it was worth it. I’ve never been in a church this ornate. We had the place nearly to ourselves and were able to stay as long as we wanted.

We finished up our last night in Prague at the famous Dancing House (also known as Fred and Ginger) designed by Frank Geary. The building is quite the sight and worth visiting. We ate dinner at the restaurant on the top of this building (the Ginger and Fred restaurant). The food at the restaurant was super artsy and a little fussy but the strawberry cheesecake with strawberry sorbet dessert was one of the best things I have ever eaten. EVER. Also, the views of the Dancing House and surrounding area in the “magic light” of 5:30 PM was perfection.

After a little more shopping it was time to pack up for our next day of travel to Munich and Dachau. Stay tuned for that post. To recap, Prague was an amazing jewel box of a city. I found it easy to navigate and each side street was more beautiful than the last. The food was fantastic, the people helpful and the prices very fair. Uber works great in Prague (we only had one problem with a car not coming). The Russian influence is evident which adds another dimension to an otherwise European experience.

Here is some of what we saw/visited during our trip to Prague:

Old Town Square

Astronomical Clock

Municipal House

Klementium

Powder Tower (my favorite building in Prague)

Charles Bridge (walked across and did a river boat cruise at sunset)

Lennon Wall (and yes, we added some of our own graffiti)

Prague Castle with St. Vitus Cathedral (this is a must)

St. Nicholas Cathedral

Palladium Mall (nothing too special; it’s just a mall in another country)

Jewish Quarter

Old New Synagogue

Dancing House and Fred & Ginger restaurant (you will need reservations here)

Have you been to Prague? Did you love it? Or have you been on the fence about visiting Prague and the Czech Republic? I hope that this post gives you some ideas and pushes you towards visiting this gorgeous gem in the heart of Europe. Stay tuned for my Munich and Dachau post!