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Places in Prague


Hradcany Castle
Few towns in the world can compete with Prague's Genius Loci. The setting is truly breathtaking and dreamlike: wood-covered hills rise followed by the majestic Hradcany castle on the left side. The castle is shocking in its size, composed of unique buildings from several epochs and immensely beautiful. It is like a little town encircling the jewel in the crown - St Vitus's Cathedral. You will find Romanesque chapels, Gothic towers, Renaissance orchards and Baroque palaces. The residence of Bohemian kings reminds of Charles IV, the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire who converted Prague in the 14th century into a European metropolis and Rudolph II, an insatiable collector of art and patron of the most famous 17th century alchemists.


Lesser Quartier
From the castle a cobbled road slopes down to the Lesser Quarter (Mala Strana). It is a poetic area. Its houses show mediaeval picture signs instead of numbers above their gates and palaces hide noble gardens where one would expect gray courtyards. There are the houses of Parliament and numerous embassies. There are monasteries and churches, each of them different and fascinating: St Nicholas and its enormous Baroque dome, fortress-like Our Lady under the Chain, Our Lady of Victory concealing a puny statue of the Bambino di Praga, up on the castle level the Loretto shrine with the Santa Casa - a house brought by angels from Nazareth to Rome or the Strahov monastery housing the Museum of National Literature. There is a lovely copy of the Eiffel tower, a labyrinth with twisted mirrors and inviting benches around the monument of the Father of Czech Romanticism, Karel Hynek Macha in the woods of the Petrin hill above the Quarter you are likely to fall in love with.


Kampa Island
The blue stripe of a river, the Vltava, severs Lesser Quarter from the town itself. Prague's Old Town starts eventually behind the ancient Charles Bridge. Before you step on this elegant bridge which is slightly bent and owes its strength to egg yolks added to the mortar, descend a little to the Kampa Island, the place damaged by the floods in summer 2002. Probably the most magical place in Prague: little Venice - a street you can cross on a boat only, haunted houses, two water mills and the John Lennon Wall - the symbol of 1980s nonconformism and resistance against communism.


Charles Bridge
Charles Bridge connects two different sides of the city and is overflowed with international folk listening to buskers' extravaganzas, buying souvenirs, drawings or paintings and touching the miraculous spot on the statue of St John Nepomuk who is said to have been hurled from here into the river. On display are 30 Baroque statues of saints, making the bridge one of the most notable open-air art museums.


Prague Old Town
The Old Town has roads bored through buildings and creepy winding lanes. The basements are in fact first or ground floors of 12-century houses, an effect caused by frequent floods in the old times. Several hundred spires and towers (Prague has approximately five hundred of them) protrude above the array and disarray of the streets and squares. The most interesting sights include Orloj, a mediaeval astronomical clock with every-hour morality play performances at the Old Town Hall, the picturesque Old Town Square, charismatic Ungelt yard, the Carolinum (the oldest university north of the Alps mountains), the Jezuite college Clementinum, the Bethlehem Chapel or the fantastic collection of Czech art in the St Agnes Monastery.
A special part of the Old Town is Josefov, the old Jewish ghetto. It is famous for the oldest synagogue in Europe, the "Alt-Neu" synagogue, a rich museum of Jewish culture, the old cemetary, and several streets with specific charm. It is now a very lively area, connected to the Old Town by Parizska Street boulevard. At the beginning of the 20th century Franz Kafka lived in Josefov. By a strange coincidence Jaroslav Hasek wrote his Good Soldier Schwejk at the same time and roughly in the same place like Kafka's The Trial.


Prague New Town
Like in Warsaw and other old European towns, Pragues New Town was founded just a few centuries after the Old Town. The centre of this area is in Wenceslas Square, at the equestrian statue of St Wenceslas, the patron saint of Czechs. The statue is in front of the Neo-Renaissance building of the National Museum. Though in the everyday life it serves merely as the most convenient meeting point, it has been a stage for the biggest events of Czech history in the last century. Historical landmarks are represented not less than in the Old Town. Architectural styles are enriched by Art Nouveau and several modernist experiments. Like the Old Town, it is a paradise for strolls, shopping, theatre-cinema-and museum-going and late evening pub-going. At the Vltava river bank there is the sumptuous building of the National Theatre and further south lies Vysehrad, Prague's second castle. The places not to miss in the New Town are also the Church of Our Lady of the Snows, the Charles's Square and the famous contemporary building of the Dancing House.

 

Places in Prague

Hradcany Castle

Lesser Quartier

Kampa Island

Charles Bridge

Prague Old Town

Prague New Town

 

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