Scenes from wandering around Prague

An enormous part of any trip for me is simply wandering around.  Stashing the map and any preconceived notions of an itinerary really lets me see a new place.  And if there is a more beautiful city in which to wander aimlessly than Prague, I haven’t visited it yet.  Paris, Stockholm, Zurich, Brussels…. all exceedingly beautiful in their own right.  But Prague has a little something else – perhaps it’s the age, the slight fading of some of its architecture that, for me anyway, makes it that much more stunning.  Here are a few of my favourite scenes from the streets of Prague from two special weeks wandering the city this past summer.

The Old Town Square kept drawing me back.  The energy of the crowds in the square in the evening (left) was palpable.  Much calmer in the early morning (right):

You can get lost in the winding, twisted streets of the Old Town.  Walking around in circles leads to scenes like these:

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A castle with a view

On the must visit list for Prague was the sprawling Prague Castle.   I was going to say the “must see” list, but the castle complex is something you can see from just about everywhere around the heart of Prague.  Its position on a hill in Mala Strana and its sheer size has it towering over the Vltava River and demanding your gaze.  No matter how picturesque the castle is from viewpoints along the river, it takes a trip through the complex to fully appreciate it.

The first stop for us inside Prague Castle is St. Vitus Cathedral.  There are a lot of beautiful churches in Prague, but this one is the most spectacular:

St. Vitus Cathedral

The outside Gothic architecture is especially striking in the early morning light and it’s a great prelude to what’s inside.  Interestingly, this is the third religious building on this site.  The precursor buildings were originally built in 925 and 1060 respectively, with this cathedral starting to take shape in the mid 1300s.

St. Vitus Cathedral

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