Czech out my blog...it's about Prague!

 I'm actually laughing out loud at my blog title hahaha I crack myself up....

This past weekend (September 13-16) Me and 15 other people from my program traveled to Prague! It was one of the best weekends of my life. I love Prague it is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been/seen! I'll just start from the beginning....

It was about 4 hours by train to get to Prague. We arrived there at about 11pm and it was kind of scary. I'm so glad we were in a big group! The hostel information gave us some (bad) directions to our hostel that said would take 10 minutes from the main train station. 30 minutes later we arrived at our hostel! There were 10 of us staying in that particular hostel and 8 of us stayed in the same room. That was really nice because we didn't have to stay in a room with complete strangers. Our hostel was great! I think most of us agreed that the beds were more comfortable than our dorm beds and the showers were definitely nicer! On Friday morning we got up kind of early and started out the morning right with some Starbucks! We decided that the first thing we wanted to do was go on one of the free tours. While we waited in Old Town Square for the tour to start we got to watch the astrological clock strike 11 and it was not anything special. I learned on the tour later on that they had to add a trumpet player at the top of the tower to make it more interesting because everyone felt the same way I did about it. The tour was really interesting and I learned a lot about the history and different things about Prague. If anyone ever travels anywhere I would recommend any free tour! The tour lasted 2 and a half hours and I was starving. We were told not to eat in Old Town Square because food is really expensive so we decided to head over the the Charles Bridge. After getting lost we stumbled upon this...

The Charles Bridge with the castle and cathedral in the background

This was one of the prettiest views I loved the Charles Bridge! We crossed the bridge after taking numerous pictures and finally found somewhere to eat. I had the most delicious pasta and a beer that I actually semi enjoyed. Afterwards we were determined on finding the John Lennon wall. Again, after getting lost a little we finally found it. It was so cool to read all the quotes and look at the drawings/paintings. I loved the John Lennon wall it was awesome!

We were on a roll with all the sight seeing and decided to go see the castle while we were on that side of the bridge. After climbing up all those stairs we finally got up to the castle and I LOVED IT. It was a really weird looking castle though. It was not a typical castle in architecture but still was really cool. It was by far one of the best views of the city! We walked around the grounds for a while and took A LOT of pictures and kind of relaxed and took it all in. I think this was my favorite part of this trip. I felt so happy and lucky to be there! We went at a really good time because the sun was almost going down and it was not crowded at all. Here are some pictures of the castle....

                                  

                                            

                               

We left the castle and walked all the way back to our hostel and my feet have never hurt so bad in my life! We relaxed at the hostel and took a nap before we went out. Paige Bordy recommended two things for that night and they were both great. The first was to go to a club that played 80's and 90's music on Friday nights. It was so much fun! The songs weren't that great at first but after a little while it started to pick up. We were on the dance floor and all the sudden a bunch of guys with animal masks on surrounded us. It was so funny. Luckily, they let us put on the masks and this is what happened when we did....

Since we did so much on Friday we decided to sleep in a little and get a later start. We really only had one thing in mind for the day, and that was go up to the Petrin Tower. This is an eiffel tower looking thing that overlooks the whole city. We were told to get on a bus and get off at a stop they showed us on the map. Well of course, we ended up getting on the wrong bus going to wrong direction. We stayed on there thinking it would loop around, but it didn't. So we had to get off that and retrace our tracks back. We finally made our way to the correct stop but we still didn't know where to go. This was kind of a stressful situation but we figured out how to get there and decided to do it! We rode the tram up to the tower and took all 200 something steps up to the top. This was also another great view of the city of Prague! 

The Petrin Tower

There was some type of festival going on so we decided to stay up there and hang out. We ate something like lo mein and it was to die for. I have missed Asian food so much! We left and decided to go back and rest for the night to come.

We did something called a Pub Crawl Saturday night. Basically, it is where they take you around to different clubs. This was such a great experience. We met so many people from so many different places. Mine and Allie's favorites were a group of boys and one girl from New Zealand. We had so much fun dancing and getting to know them. We even found out the girl was a rower! They were awesome! The last club we went to was a five story dance club. Each story has different types of music. This place was so much fun I don't understand why Murray doesn't have one haha! Again, if anyone is traveling places and you want to go out to the clubs I would recommend a pub crawl it was worth the money! Also we got a free t-shirt! I told you my feet have never hurt so bad after the first day....after wearing boot heels to this pub crawl I would have happily chopped off my feet. They were in excruciating pain. And I don't normally complain about pain! 

Sunday we had to check out of the hostel at 11 but still got to keep our bags there. We took sunday as a day of shopping. Since our feet (mine and Allie's) were hurting so bad we had to stop and sit down every chance we got. Sunday was a fun day and we got some good deals too! Prague was so much fun I loved every second I was there! I am so lucky to be experiencing this whole trip!

In a previous blog I talked about how I wouldn't get home sick and I'm still not but I just miss a lot of things! John (my humanities teacher) told us there were 4 stages each study abroad student goes through and I am definitely experiencing stage number 2. I miss a lot of foods and the way we do things in America. I miss free refills, ICE, cold anything, having a freezer, having a microwave etc... I'm still having the time of my life and I don't want this to sound like I don't want to be here but free refills and some ice would be good every now and then! 

My classes have not gotten better, but my outlook on them has which has helped. I have just come to the realization that I will be miserable from monday-thursday and have the time of my life on the weekends!