Week #3

Street Artist in Prague had a giant bubble wand
Courtesy of Kassidy McConville

             One train and in two short hours we all arrived back in Prague Thursday afternoon for our first field trip. Checked in, settled down, and refreshed we headed out the door to start our city tours led by Jan and Martin. First, they took us to see the town squares so we got familiar with the area and what was around them. Venturing our ways through the Easter crowds they showed us the astronomical clock and talked some about the history of certain buildings.

Exploring new foods in the Easter markets of Prague
Courtesy of Kassidy McConvile

On Friday morning we woke up early to continue our site seeing of Prague. We climbed our way up many stairs and visited the Prague Castle. Standing outside we got to see the changing of the guards too! I thought that it was would simple and would not take much time, but it was a good 15 minutes with music too. On this day we also saw St. Vitus Cathedral. This was an impressive building and it is the metropolitan cathedral of saints, Vitus, Wenceslaus, and Adalbert. This cathedral is a Gothic masterpiece and it dominates the skyline of Prague. Fun fact: When the sun sets it looks as though the sun is going into the cathedral! For the rest of that day we went exploring the Easter markets and trying new foods.

Saturday, we woke up early again and hopped on a train for Dresden Germany. I was very excited to go to Germany to be in a different culture, language, and history. Dresden had been bombed heavily in the year of 1945 and a large number of people had been killed. We were told that the smoke had took a significant number of lives during this time too. Today, you can still see the devastation that had been done. Some buildings have black stones now and even when they rebuilt

Outside of St. Vitus
Courtesy of Kassidy McConville

they used some of the black stones from the bombings to create the newer buildings too . We had some delicious pasta for lunch then we got to climb our way to the top of the Luthern Cathedral, where the views were breathtaking! It was such a beautiful day that we hung out looking out over the city for most of our free time. After meeting back up with the group some of us went to a famous art museum and were able to walk around viewing the pieces from all different centuries. It was really neat to see how the styles change as you went from floor to floor. After, we had a little bit more free time and we explored the city before returning back to the train station.

Holy Hill
Courtesy of Kassidy McConville

Back in Prague, I slept in a little bit later and had breakfast with some friends right by our hostel to start off our Easter morning! We meet up with the rest of the group and got to visit the Jewish Quarters. Jan and Martin told us so many facts about each thing that we saw there. After, we went to lunch at Nagrilu and had wings! This is my favorite place to eat at in Prague and it was a little slice of home with how it was decorated and they even played country music!

What a view
Courtesy of Kassidy McConville

We always seem to be on the go, Monday morning we had to wake up to be back at the train station at 6:45am. Teresa and Ann took us on a day trip to visit Mikulov and Znojmo. They were both small and very quiet towns, but they were so beautiful. It was a good change from our usual concrete jungle scene. After getting ice cream we hiked to the top of Holy Hill and were able to see all of Mikulov. It was a wonderful day getting to relax in wine country with the group.

Field trip #1 a success. So much exploring and laughter with friends I am so thankful to have meet. 

Courtesy of Kassidy McConville