Prague, Day 15 (New Year's Eve)

The entrance to Prague Castle. Not very welcoming in my opinion, with statues of things being bludgeoned and stabbed.

The cathedral behind the castle. Spectacular.

Changing of the guard.

1. Feeling 10,000 times better today
2. Walked across the Charles Bridge, through the Little Quarter with its hilly windy cobblestone streets, up to the Prague Castle on the top of the hill. So old and beautiful...so much history here. There are violent statues at the front gates, people about to be clubbed and stabbed. I guess they want to send the message that you don't want to mess with this castle
3. Noon everyday at the castle they have the changing of the guards, with maybe 50 guards and a band, quite a lengthy ceremony. The uniforms are cool, gray pants with a darker grey stripe down the side, long dark blue jacket with gold buttons, silverly fur collars and big silver fur hats
4. Hordes and hordes and hordes of tourists in Prague. It's a little overwhelming
5. New Year's Eve in Prague: pretty unbelievable. First, a yummy, quite fancy meal at a restaurant called Phenix, right next to our hotel. There's a cool old silver metal spiral staircase in the back with a four leaf clover pattern stamped into it, so cool. Then we had drinks at a little bar with wood and arched ceilings called the Hemmingway Bar. Eleven thirty we started to make our way to the Charles Street Bridge, and then we were on the bridge just packed with people, everyone so close that it's not even cold. At midnight the boats on the water blew their horns and everyone cheered and sang, some nice Italian women next to us gave us a glass of champagne and the fireworks...people everywhere in the crowd setting them off and then the city fireworks right above us, like you were in the middle of them, they weren't safely off in the distance like in the US, the smell of the gunpowder strong. What a great, great night. We had the best time...