Charles Bridge Museum

Visited the Charles Bridge Museum, this was a great place to visit as the construction of the bridge began in 1357 and was finished being built in the beginning of the 15th century. The Charles Bridge was the link between Prague Castle and Old Town and the only way to cross the river Vltava until 1841. In the Museum you could walk down underneath and see different layers of bridge that had been constructed at different times. Under the bridge there is also a church from the middle ages when the church went underground, literally! There were statues of Jesus and Mary behind rock pillars and the pulpit was built into rock, kind of earthy smelling and amazing to look at. It is brillant how all these places were made with people power and limited resources compared with what we have today. Corban and Leo have both been given bikes along with a pile of toys from a neighbour and a family leaving. We still need to get some training wheels for Leo, but the kids didn't mind sharing. It was so nice that they were given so much stuff after giving away or selling pretty much everything they had!

Velvet Revolution

This weekend was the celebration of the Velvet Revolution. This was a non-violent revolution in Czechoslovakia when communism ended and it became a republic on the 17th November 1989. In the Czech Republic they celebrate the Velvet Revolution by marching/parading through the main streets, heaps of loud speakers, people dressed up and more police than I have ever seen in my life! We happened to be going the opposite direction so got the full show. Prior to the march we visited the Lennon Wall. The Beetles music was banned under the communist regime. Someone painted a picture of John Lennon on the wall, every time the wall was white washed that night the picture would reappear. Over time the wall became a symbol of peace, love and freedom where many polical messages where written. Eventually the authorities gave up cleaning the wall. All of the padlocks you see on the bridge are people locking their love together, they do this and then throw the keys into the water. We also did a boat cruise this weekend. It was pretty cool, we had to catch a smaller boat out to the main boat where you are given a hot drink and ginger bread while the tour guide tell you about the local area. Ironically after everything I have learnt about communism this week it is interesting to know that the Czech Republic elections are coming up and the Communist Party are polling 2nd!

Wedding Anniversary

Allan and I celebrated our wedding anniversary very simply on the 1st November. We waited for the kids to go to sleep and went for a walk. There are always night markets in Prague, so we wandered around until we found one and ate some traditional Czech food. We picked some fried potato on a stick and trdelnik which is like a sugar rolled cinnamon sugar bread thing. The photos don't do the castle justice at night, it's an amazing view.

Retracing Our Step

We spent a weekend going back through Old Town which we did when we first arrived. Although some photos might look similar we have a better understanding/knowledge of the things we are seeing and still seeing many new sights. We had to laugh at a few things, Leo particularly like the men statues ... he responded with "look they're weeing!" A few nights ago Taylor showed us a funny random picture on facebook of a narrow stairway with a stop and go walking signal ... much to our surprise we walked past the exact place in the weekend! Hilarious, it's just a walkway to a resturant on the river. The big statue of the king is 'King Charles IV of Bohemia'. Basically he was the King over a really big area Bohemia (large part of Europe), the Roman Empire, Italy etc Prague was the capital at the time. He was the person who built the 'Charles Bridge'that you see in many photos of Prague. Sigmund Freud is the statue hanging from the building, I think it is supposed to symbolise mans helplessness in the modern world or something like that. The enormous metronome was built after a giant monument of the former Soviet leader Joseph Stalin was blown up. Is symbolises the movement between good and bad leadership. There is living history everywhere we go, it is amazing how much we are learning all the time.

Monument that was blown up before metronome was built, apparently it stood about as high as the Jesus statue in Brazil.