Pub Crawl & Jazz Cruise

It probably doesn’t come as a surprise to most of you, but the Czechs are known for their beer and drinking in general. So in order to properly orient ourselves with Czech drinking and to celebrate before the start of classes we did an organized pub-crawl. We started the pub-crawl with about 70 people and ended up with close to 150 when we arrived at Prague’s famous 5-story nightclub. All in all we had a great night, we drank lots of Pilsner (Czech beer) and met travelers from all around the world.

Start of the pubcrawl

Roommate picture

First shot of the night

Group of girls from school 

Tara and I, too bad the guy in the back tried to ruin the picture

Morgan, our new friend and neighbor from New England Law School, celebrated her 23^rd birthday on Monday. To celebrate her birthday and surviving the first day of class we decided to take a jazz cruise down the Vltava River to enjoy the amazing views of Prague while sharing some Czech wine and dinner. We had an amazing time listening to the live band and getting to know people from our school program.  

Before boarding the boat

Happy Birthday Morgan!

View of Charles Bridge from the water

Group Picture

Tara, Erica and I

Malá Strana (“Little Quarter”)

Today we ventured across the famous Charles Bridge into the beautiful area of Malá Strana. Our first stop was at the Lennon Wall created in the 1980’s by young Czechs to protest against communism.  After John Lennon’s murder the wall was painted with his image and turned into a memorial. The secret police white washed the wall multiple times and to their failure the following days the wall was full of messages and poems. Today the wall is a symbol of peace and is full of graffiti and messages in languages from all around the world. Unfortunately we didn’t have a marker or paint so we’ll have to go back to write on it. 

Charles Bridge

Touch for good luck or love...not sure which one I touched-guess we'll see!

On Charles Bridge

After the Lennon Wall we found the Petrin Lookout Tower which is a 62 meter tall Effile Tower lookalike. We took an elevator to the top and saw some of the most amazing views overlooking Prague. 

Mini Eiffel Tower

View of Old Town (where we live) from the Tower

Prague Castle

Czech Orientation

Yesterday was our summer school orientation we figured it would be a quick morning of getting to know our classmates and some advice to help familiarize ourselves with Prague. Little did we know it would be a 3-hour Czech history lesson from 955-1989. While the lecture was interesting, jet-lag and a slight hangover made the morning pretty miserable. The best part of orientation was meeting our neighbors! We met two girls (Tara and Morgan) from New England Law School in Boston that live in the same small apartment building as us. 

Charles University Law School

In order to save money we decided to go grocery shopping walked half way across the Czech Republic (or at least it felt like it) and found a huge chain grocery store called the Billa. I attempted to take pictures of the store but got yelled at by an employee, at least I got one! Grocery shopping is much more difficult when everything is in Czech we had to guess what everything was, poor Erica bought liquid sour cream instead of coffee creamer. 

Inside the Billa

Groceries

After trying a few days of trying Czech food (which is pretty interesting) we all agreed it would be best to hunt down some Mexican food. We found an awesome place pretty close to our apartment we had delicious Mexican food and even got free tequila shots. After dinner we wandered around and found a trendy bar called Harley’s, the bar was full of Harley motorcycle décor it was a pretty rowdy place but seems really fun, I’m sure we’ll make it back there in the next 6 weeks. 

Sangria

Harley's Bar

Toast to Czech beer!

Apartment & Tour of Prague

After figuring out the internet problem, I think of all of us agree that we couldn't have found a better apartment!

Erica and I in our entry way

Kelsey outside our apartment

Our creepy elevator/lift

We are less than a 3 minute walk to the main area of Prague, Old Town Square. Old Town is definitely busy and full of tourists, shops, restaurants, bars and of course incredible buildings.

 Old Town Square

Yesterday we decided to take a bus tour of Prague to see some of the main attractions. It was nice to get a general idea of where everything is located and quickly view areas such as Prague Castle, New Town and Josefov (the Czech Jewish community). Unfortunately our tour guide's English was hard to understand and we were all so exhausted the tour seem never ending.

Prague Castle-The picture really doesn't do it justice

Inside Prague Castle

Guard at the Castle

View of Prague from the Castle

At the Castle overlooking Prague and a vineyard planted in the 10th century 

We Made It!

Well we finally made to Prague and have settled in our apartment. We left LAX airport on Monday and arrived in Switzerland about 10 hours later which was sometime in the afternoon the following day. After a short flight delay and a small mix up by Erica and I with the difference between the men and women's restroom we landed in Prague. Our awesome Czech landlord met us at the airport, she is learning English and is hard to understand but nonetheless a total sweetheart. The first night here was pretty rough, we were exhausted, hungry and couldn't figure out the internet in our apartment (so naturally I was freaking out). Fortunately we have figured out the internet and are starting to get the hang of Czech life.