Praha - Day II

We began Sunday with a funicular ride up to the top of Petrin hill in order to get a nice view of Prague from above. At the top of the hill is an observation tower that looks a bit like the Eiffel Tower, so we decided to walk up the 299 steps required to get to the top in order to have the best possible view.

The observation tower indeed offered a beautiful view of the city, with Prague Castle on the left (top photo below) and the Charles Bridge as well as the Old Town to the right (bottom photo below).

On our way back down the hill we stopped at the St. Nicholas Cathedral, which dates to the 13th century (at least in part) and is known for its recognizable belltower.

I liked the interior -- particularly the view of the massive dome from below.

Next we visited the Josefov, Prague's Jewish Quarter, which includes a number of sites related to the country's Jewish history. It was interesting to see but very sad as well given the devastation inflicted by the Nazis during WWII (less than 3% of country's Jewish population remained after the war).

We spent the remainder of the afternoon walking around and enjoying the scenery / architecture. I think Prague is definitely one of the more beautiful cities that I've seen.

We passed countless buildings with interesting facades like the ones below.

We decided to grab an early dinner rather than roll the dice on airport / airplane food. On the way to the restaurant, we walked back across the Charles Bridge. I assume that one has to get up pretty early to see the bridge without anyone else on it.

There were a couple of puppeteers performing on the bridge and I was really impressed by their skills. They had music playing and the puppets were perfectly sychronized to the drums and guitar.

While we didn't end up getting traditional Czech fare for dinner (as appetizing as goulash sounded), we at least decided to go for a traditional Czech drink -- beer. According to our cab driver from the first night, the average Czech drinks around three beers a night (I have no idea whether this is actually true, but did "confirm" via Wikipedia that the country has the highest per capita beer consumption in the world...). Na zdraví!

Praha - Day I

 We began our Prague visit by walking up the hill to Prague Castle, which is reportedly the largest castle in the world. Over its 1,000+ year history, it has served as the residence of Bohemian Kings, Holy Roman Emperors and presidents of both Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic.

Emilie and I decided to go for the "short" visit, which includes entrance to the majority of the castle's main sights. My favorite part was the St. Vitus Cathedral, whose construction began in the 14th century and took over 600 years.

The inside was pretty impressive, with a very high ceiling and beautiful stained glass windows.

I also really liked the Zlatá ulička (Golden Lane), which is the site of the 16th century houses of the castle's marksmen. Given the number of marksmen and the limited space, the houses are extremely tiny and appear better suited for elves than people. A notable resident in more "recent" times was Franz Kafka.

Our next "stop" was the Charles Bridge, which we took to get to the city's Old Town area. The bridge dates back to the mid-14th century and is named after Charles IV, who was Holy Roman Emperor at the time. Here's a view of the bridge taken from a couple hundred yards down river.

I particularly liked the guard towers on each side as well as the bridge's 30 statues, which date back to the early 18th century.

The bridge also offered a nice view of Prague Casle, which can be seen at the top of the hill in the photo below.

After crossing the bridge we visited the Staroměstské náměstí, the Old Town's main square. During December it is home to a large Christmas market, which allowed for a nice picture (the late-afternoon sun definitely helped as well).

The square contains the world's third-oldest astronomical clock, which was built in 1410 (it's also the oldest one in the world that is still functioning). It is visible at the base of the clock tower on the left in the photo below.

Shortly thereafter it was time for us to head back to the hotel for a quick meal as we had tickets to see Carmen at the Prague State Opera House. Here's a picture that I took along the way that shows one of Prague's many bridges just after sunset.

The performance was excellent and the venue was beautiful. To demonstrate my ignorance when it comes to opera, I never knew before the show that Carmen was a French opera.

After the opera we broke one of our cab driver-from-last-night's rules -- never grab a cab on the street as they will charge you a horrendous fare. We were freezing, however, and it was getting late, so we figured we were willing to pay a premium just to get back to the hotel fast. And we ended up bargaining a bit and only paid about half of what the first driver that passed asked for, so we considered that a bit of a victory.

Prague

This weekend Emilie and I are visting Prague, a city that I've wanted to see for a long time given all the great feedback on it that I've heard from others. Emilie visited the city with her parents about 20 years ago, so in a way it's like seeing a new city for her as well.

We arrived late tonight as we didn't find a direct flight and instead had to connect through Frankfurt. As such, we headed straight to the hotel from the airport and didn't plan anything for this evening. We have all day tomorrow and almost all of Sunday to explore, though, so we should be able to see a lot during our stay.

Our hotel is in the Malá Strana ("Lesser Town") neighborhood of the city, which is below Prague Castle and just across the river from the Old Town. The decor in the hotel is pretty interesting. Our room feels like we went back in time a couple of centuries.

One of the things that I had heard about Czechs is that they are very nice people and this has definitely proved to be true thus far (though we're dealing with a small sample size -- 1). Our cab driver gave us a nice overview of the city and some helpful tips to ensure a smooth visit.

Joyeux Noel

 

Thanks to Emilie, our apartment is now Christmas-ready. I came home the other day to find the tree trimmed, the stockings hung and a wide-range of miscellaneous x-mas decorations set up.

The newest addition is a Nativity scene that Emilie bought last weekend at one of the Christmas markets in Alsace.

Return to Riquewihr

This morning we returned to Riquewihr to visit Feerie de Noel, the Christmas shop that had closed before we arrived last night.

Here's the queue to get into the store. There must have been about 50 people in line when we arrived but it fortunately went fairly quickly.

Once inside, it was basically structured like a miniature Christmas version of IKEA -- i.e., one-way only with the cash registers at the end. And if you like Christmas decorations (ornaments, snow globes, nut crackers, Nativity scenes, etc., etc.) you would have been in heaven.

I hadn't planned on buying anything, but it's probably impossible to make it through the whole store empty handed. Given the initial line and the time required to navigate the one-way path, you almost feel obligated to make a purchase. And so I did.

Our return to Riquewihr also gave us the opportunity to tour the city a bit with the benefit of daylight. I liked the traditional buildings, with their angular wooden designs and interesting colors.

For lunch we had reservations at L'Auberge de L'Ill in nearby Illhaeusern. The restaurant is by far the most acclaimed restaurant that I've ever dined at (it's held three Michelin stars since 1967) and we were seated in a nice private spot just off the main dining area.

The food was excellent, as should be expected I guess. Here are a few pictures of the courses ordered by either Emilie, her mom or me.

After the meal we walked around for a bit as a three-hour car ride was the only remaining item on our itinerary. I took the following picture from a bridge just adjacent to the restaurant.

Alsace

This weekend Emilie and I went with her mom to visit the Alsace region of France to see a few of the small towns in the area that are known for their Christmas markets. We're staying in Thann, which is about three hours north of Lausanne (via Basel).

The weather was cold and rainy, which provided little motivation to explore after our arrival. Here's a picture of a plaza near our hotel where we found a restaurant to grab a quick bite to eat and escape from the cold.

The weather finally cleared in the late-afternoon, so we headed to the Kaysersberg for our first real visit of the trip. The town has a medieval feel to it and was part of Germany up until WWI, as may have been surmised from the name ("Kaisersberg" = "emperor's mountain" in German).

By the time that we arrived it was dark (the sun sets before 5pm now) and we struggled a bit to find a parking space. It seems we weren't the only ones who decided to visit the city's famous Christmas markets.

The atmosphere was very festive, with packed streets full of people kicking off the Christmas season. Here's a picture that I took of the city's medieval church.

There was Christmas decor everywhere, including the following Nativity scene that was set up at the base of a statue in a plaza.

After exploring the city's sights and window shopping at the x-mas stores for a couple hours (primarily the former, for me), we finished up our visit. Here's a picture that I took from a bridge during our walk back to the car. The style of the house in the middle of the photo is very typical for the area.

Next we headed to the nearby town of Riquewihr, which is one of the few towns in the area that wasn't heavily damaged during WWII and thus still maintains much of its 16th century architecture.

Unfortunately for us, the Riquewihr visit didn't go according to script. First, the Christmas store that Emilie specifically planned our trip to Alsace around had already closed for the day (fortunately, we can make a return trip tomorrow). Second, the restaurant where we had booked a reservation didn't serve the Alsacian specialty that Emilie and her mom specifically wanted -- tarte flambée.

And given that tarte flambée is apparently a "must" for any Alsacian visit, we cancelled our existing reservation and instead searched for a back-up restaurant. This was a risky maneuver given the town's small size and the throngs of tourists, but we ultimately found a nice restaurant that wasn't complet AND served tarte flambée.

So what exactly is tarte flambée? It's effectively a rectangular, pizza-like baked dish with cheese,  crème fraîche, thinly sliced onions and lardons (small strips of pork fat -- basically bacon). And I have to admit, it was very good and well worth the extra trouble. Here's a photo (trust me, it tasted much better than it looks...).

Thanksgiving

 

This year Emilie helped take my mind off what I was missing back home by organizing a real Thanksgiving experience. It entailed a full day of cooking (almost exclusively by her) and we were joined by her mother and sister to round out the family atmosphere.

Here's the guest of honor -- the turkey. While it was smaller than the turkeys that we normally have back home (it was "only" 9 lbs), the oven was barely big enough to accomodate it.

As seen in the photo below, Emilie was clearly excited by her successful initial foray into American holiday cooking.

The meal was fantastic and went a long way towards addressing my annual Thanksgiving homesickness. I think Emilie's mom and sister also enjoyed their first real exposure to the holiday.

After the meal we had plenty of leftovers -- including about 2/3 of the turkey itself, which I still had to carve. That was fine by me as I love eating Turkey the week after Thanksgiving.

My only complaint -- all the clean-up required after the meal. In all my Thanksgivings, I don't think I have ever done my fair share in terms of dishes. As such, I had no real clue of the actual clean-up required (particularly if, like us, you don't have a dishwasher).

Intouchables

Tonight we went to see a French film called Intouchables (Untouchable). It was released early this month and has become a phenomenon in France (and Switzerland), generating extremely positive reviews and strong word-of-mouth.

The film was inspired by true events and tells the story of a wealthy Parisian, who is paralyzed following a paragliding accident, and the full-time assistant he hires to help him with his daily life. The duo come from very different backgrounds, but they share a common bond and over the course of the film develop a meaningful friendship.

While the film is comedic throughout, it also is filled with dramatic elements and by the end is one of the more touching movies that I've seen in a long time. I think even the most hardened individual will shed a couple of tears at the end.

The U.S. distribution rights for the film have been bought by Harvey Weinstein, so it should be arriving in the U.S. at some point. And in the meantime, I found a trailer online that includes English subtitles. You'll probably want to expand the video to full screen (click button on bottom right of video next to "YouTube") in order to be able to read them.

Unfortunately, the subtitles are horrendous (there's no way this is an official version), but I figured that a version with bad subtitles would be better than one without any.

I don't think that the trailer really does it justice, though, so you'll have to trust me that the film's a must-see.

Fondue

Tonight Emilie invited her friend Nina over for dinner in celebration of her transfer back to the U.S. for work. And in order to make it a true Swiss send-off, Emilie decided to prepare fondue.

The meal was great, as demonstrated by the fact that not a drop of cheese remained at the end. Emilie got the consistency just right and prepared the perfect amount -- just enough for us to be full, but not too much to leave us suffering from massive food comas afterwards.

Proud to be an American?

 

While there are many stereotypes for Americans who visit Europe, “loud and obnoxious” is one in particular that gets a lot of airtime. And though I generally disagree with the label (most American travelers that I’ve come across represent the country well), there are unfortunately a small group that live up to the stereotype and make the rest of us look bad.

An example…

The other day I was on the train and there happened to be a group of fellow Americans sitting in an adjacent section of seats. The train was basically full, so there were plenty of conversations going amongst the travelers, yet one group managed to drown out everyone else with their blabbing: the Americans. It was as if they were in their own private compartment and the rest of the train simply didn’t exist.

The best part was that they spoke as if English were some obscure language that no one else on the train could possibly have understood. Regardless of how offensive, vulgar, impolite, culturally-insensitive, etc., a topic was, they had no problem discussing it. Meanwhile, I’m sure that at least half of the other travelers on the train understood every word that they said.

Back from China

On Sunday Emilie and I returned from a two week trip to China. Though it was technically vacation, there wasn't much time for R&R as we tried to cover as much of the country as possible during our maiden voyage to the Middle Kingdom. And while we saw a ton, it was clear that we only scratched the surface during our visit.

The following is a brief list of the main cities / sights that we saw. I'll go into more detail and add pictures (I took ~1,500) over the coming weeks as I get caught up. That said, I'm still lagging on my early-October plan to get caught up on my already delinquent posts from September (most notably covering my parents' visit and the trip to Brittany for Emilie's sister's wedding), so perhaps I should set lower expectations.

Main Cities and Sights:

• Beijing: The Forbidden City / Tienanmen Square / Summer Palace / The Great Wall
• Pingyao: Ancient city walls / Shuanglin (Buddhist) Temple
• Xian: Great Mosque; Terracotta Army
• Chengdu: Panda Reserve / Leshan Giant Buddha / Mt. Emei Golden Summit
• Huanglong: scenic nature reserve / Tibetan villages
• Jiuzhaigou Valley: scenic nature reserve / Tibetan villages
• Shanghai: The Bund riverfront / acrobat show / tea houses

Otherwise, the highlights of the trip were definitely the food, the culture and the general experience of being absolutely helpless / clueless in a land nothing like anything remotely close to your comfort zone. That said, there were negatives as well, which I'll also cover -- e.g., the clearly visible societal and environmental consequences of the country's massive growth.