I woke up very excited Friday morning, looking forward to visiting Prague that afternoon and seeing Sam after two weeks. I spent most of the morning checking my watch, willing time to somehow go faster so I could finally be at the airport. Lessons went well, with no embarrassing mistakes (for the first time ever!), although when we started talking about superstition I did get a little freaked out.. I hadn't realised Sam would be catching two flights on Friday the 13th! Feeling mildly concerned about him landing safely, but mostly still excited, I whiled away the next couple of hours of lessons...
At 1 o'clock I went and found Nic and Tadeja, who were also planning on going to Prague for a spot of shopping. We headed to the fave cafe on the naměstí (square), the aptly named Square Cafe, and ordered the most delicious pasta dish ever - lots of pesto, bacon, chicken pieces, spinach and about half a block of cheese! After lunch we popped back to the kolej to grab our things and left for the station, luckily only getting lost once.
After buying our tickets and confusedly going up and down the underpass three times, we finally found our train. Yay the Prague adventure was beginning!
We arrived at Hlav Naž only 10 minutes late (impressive for Czech trains!) just enough time for me to run round the station a few times, following the traditionally awful Czech signs, and find the Airport Express bus.
30 minutes squashed between a family and a business man later and I was at the airport - woo!
Waiting at arrivals I played the highly amusing game of "Guess the man on the sign". The game consisted of watching the men holding signs - taxi companies etc. - as a new bunch of businessmen came through the gate. The Sign Men then surged forward clearly crying "PICK ME, PICK ME!" in their heads. Those who managed to scoop up a businessman or two then looked smugly at the other and left. Such fun.
Ten minutes of Sign-Man-Game later and the boy walks through the door. This time it was my turn to look smugly at the other waitees - haha I won! We hopped back on the Airport Express bus to Hlav Naž and I pointed out some sights on the way (Charles bridge, TV Tower, the Eiffel Tower look-alike on the hill, etc.) On arriving at the station, the first thing we did was buy a map of Prague, then we left the station only to be confused almost immediately. On one side of Hlav Naž is a nice park - the way we should have gone - on the other side is a huge mismatch of motorways and dual carriageways - the way we decided to go..
After going in and out the station a few times from a variety of directions, we eventually decided on our route and wandered up and down the cobbled streets of Žižkov, in Prague 3. Unfortunately due to a large amount of dithering plus a noticeably long route, it took us an hour to reach the hotel...
We checked in - the woman thought I was Czech until I gave her my passport, YAY! - and decided to go into the centre of Prague, roughly a 23 minute walk, to grab some dinner.
Eventually, after a lot of indecision and wandering round the Old Town, we decided on a nice looking pizza place just off of Vaclav Naměstí. Some food and a walk later and we decided to head back to the hotel for some pivo and sleep, ready for the day of exploration that would follow!
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