Praha, or Prague, as we spell it

Well that is how I look after I pass a big test. Like a breathalyzer test. It was my very first one and I passed it on my very first try! Might add it is a good thing Patt read the AAA guide to the Czech Republic as we were driving out of Austria into the old western end of Czechoslovakia- only don’t call it that, it's been the Czech Republic since 1989. The tolerance for driving and alcohol is zero in the CR. They take drinking and driving seriously here.

To cut to the chase, we were involved in a minor car accident. In a about 20 minutes of very slow driving as we were entering Prague on a three lane (one way) highway inching along we got hit from behind by one of the nicest guys you would ever want to meet. A electrical engineer, Josef, spoke English very well (THANKFULLY) and admitted guilt to the police and us - hard for him to avoid it I suspect.  

As you can see his car has a little damage to the hood and front left of the plastic bumper.  Our car had less to the the rear bumper but still scraped up a bit. We are the first drivers of our car so it shows up pretty well - car had 35 km on the speedometer when we started out from Vienna. 

We created quite a traffic jam, only one guy yelled at us and I think he was telling Josef that one of his blinkers was out. Emergency highway guys and ambulance people came rather quickly, got us off the road, ascertained no injuries and left with instructions to wait for the police. The police came and wrote a report in Czech. Since I learned Czech while waiting, no problem.

The drive up from Austria. other than that Mrs. Lincoln, was quite nice. Austria had some beautiful farms and massive wind mills,

We stopped just inside the Czech Republic to have lunch in Velle Mezirici. I left out the umlauts, titles, and dash marks that should go over most of the letters in the town's name.

Patt on Charles Bridge, probably the most visited place in Prague, named after King Charles IV most famous and powerful of all kings in Czech history.  He was even ruler of the Holy Roman Empire during his reign.  He had the bridge, tower and arch (in the background) built in the 1357.   The bridge has been here a while.  Our bed and breakfast is about 30 yards behind the tower on the same street.  Patt can find a good location for us to stay when we visit a city.  

And Patt still on the Charles Bridge and taken still looking west. There will be more photos of the King Charles Bridge and environs.

These guys set up on Mostecka Street across from our hotel on Saturday and were there for a pretty good while I reckon. Patt and I came back across Charles Bridge and there they were.  We watched a while along with several dozen others, a few went up and waved hands around and such, a few tossed in coins. After 10-15 minutes Patt and I left.  Consensus of the few in the crowd that I spoke with or heard talking, “pretty darn good magic trick”  It is not hard to find someone to speak with in English. It is universal.

A historic place in Prague is Wenceslas Square. It is where Czechs have gathered in protest or celebration over the centuries. It is where demonstrations against the Soviets were held in 1968 that led to a Russian invasion. And again today there was a demonstration against the Russian occupation of Ukraine. We spoke with one of the demonstrators and Patt asked if he were Ukrainian and he responded, “No, I am Czech … Czech-European”. Czech flag, red, blue and white, Ukrainian yellow and blue.

Wenceslas Square is named for THAT King Wenceslas of Christmas Carol fame, the good King. He was born in 905 AD and became King of the Czech’s, and a good one, then was killed by his evil brother who became an equally evil king. The square now is surrounded by hotels, restaurants, and beautiful tulip beds

The Tulip beds in the middle of Wenceslas Square are beautiful and were in full bloom this first week of May.

And back to the hotels. Just how large do you think the rooms are in the Meran Hotel?

A quirky restaurant for dinner. The Czech beer is awesome. The wine, well we have not tried so much as the beer is good and so cheap.

And back on Mostecka Street, this time just across from our hotel. Charles Bridge Tower in the background. 

Vienna, my new favorite painting, and Franz Joseph and the Hapsburgs

Now this is the Schoenbrunn Palace, just a little summer place. If our ship ever comes in, if our bird ever lands in that bush or if our chicken ever hatches an egg, this is the kind of place I am considering with my piece of that pie. And this is just the front. Empress Marie Theresa, master politician, great leader of a nation, mother of 16 children, not afraid to marry them off for advantage either, liked her summers on the outskirts of the city. I might too.

This is the backyard. The gardens are extensive to the right and left. The Gloriette or building with no apparent purpose is at the top of the hill.  Franz Joseph and his wife Elizabeth (known as Sisi) spent summers here too.

View from the fountain in front of the Gloriette. Oh the Schoenbrunn is full of art, fancy rooms, period furniture, and rooms decorated from Franz Joseph's travels. He was emperor from 1848  to 1916. His mindset was part of the reason the death rate of soldiers in WWI was so very very high. The old military leadership thought more like the Civil War while the equipment and machinery was more like WWII.

Just a little thing. 

That is Patt waving on the steps to the left of the monstrosity that is something resembling a Greek or Roman statute over a lion. There were four of them. There was lots of statutory in the gardens most quite attractive and copies of Roman and Greek art. The usual, Hercules bashing someone's head, a Greek or Roman God capturing a woman who forgot to dress that day and so on.

We also went to the Military Museum. Austria's history is linked to its military success or failure as a bulwark against Islam and the ambitions of other European emerging nations. I liked this guy. No doubt as to his intentions. The actual painting is probably 10-12 feet high. I think it would look good behind someone's desk.

The museum had tons of armor and swords as well as the car of the nephew of the Emperor Franz Joseph, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand. whose assassination on June 28, 1914, in Sarajevo precipitated World War I. Note bullet hole just behind spare tire - this bullet killed Ferdinand's wife Sofie, the second bullet killed the archduke (this was the second assassination attempt that day).

The museum also had a pretty good section of WWI and WWII memorabilia including a uniform of a Austrian member of the German Waffen SS complete with a death's head patch on the headgear.  I was sort of surprised to see how much WWI and  WWII stuff they had in the museum. (Sorry about the quality of the photo)

Now to change gears—

From the Belvedere Museum, one of my new favorite museums, comes my new very favorite painting. This was painted by Wilhelm Trubner about 1878. A little humor there with the title too.  Any idea of what the next painting with Caesar would be titled if Wilhelm did two paintings about him and a river in Italy? A little understanding of classical history helps. (google helps with that)

Caesar at the Rubicon 

Also at the Belvedere was this picture by an artist who for the time being will be unknown. Patt liked this one.

Some of the art in the Belvedere was from the collection of Empress Marie Theresa's favorite daughter and her husband who had been King and Queen of the Netherlands briefly until Napoleon beat Austria and the Netherlands in a war. Well, the daughter and son-in law and their 500 servants had to load up their art collection and household belongings into three barges and head back home to Vienna. Only two barges made it back. Never mind, the two barges were still a lot.

My favorite part of the story - the son-in-law, who apparently did nothing after not being King, and becoming a widower, without producing a child with the Empresses' daughter and due to said daughter's love for him and a tightly written will, he remained with"all his dignities and well circumstanced throughout the remainder of his life". Not real sure what that means, but I will take it.

Patt and I also took a cruise on the Danube River, starting in the Canal built as part of flood control project abut 100 years ago. Due to the cold cloudy day we were two of the few on the ship and had a very pleasant trip.

A not so roughing it fisherman - TV satellite, solar panels, and a net that takes no more work than lowering onto the river bottom, leaving a while then using the counter weights to lift and viola, its done.

We passed 15 or 20 or more cruise line ships tied up as much as four across. No wonder the city was full of people.

And guess who likes to ride the Hop On Hop Off buses — we do. Well especially I do. And we did here too. We got the pass that included free admission into museums, boat rides and such and gosh it was worth it.  We did not get the first in line pass but the crowds were not too bad except for the occasional double grouping of tour groups in a museum or two. Then things could get clogged up.

But we saw art, here from the Kunsthistorisches Museum. This museum, the largest of the many we were in, had art from Rubens, Caravaggio, van Eck, Raphael, Vermeer and a whole lot more artists.  It also had ancient collections, jewels, large gold objects from the second century BC. . .

And I also like Rembrandt's self portrait.  He painted himself with a few years behind him and a few difficulties as part of his life. Not some idealized delusional version of himself. At least that was according to the recording on the audioguide.

There were several painters/artists copying existing work of the masters.  I like that idea. And watching them a bit.

And the Hapsburgs were ambitious. Not satisfied with beating the Turks in Europe, they fought with Arabs in North Africa.

Now on to Prague.

Vienna - seeing some sights and doing some cultural

This is the steeple for St Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna. It is a landmark and the largest cathedral in the city.  Like most of the city is was damaged by Allied (largely American) bombing during the World War II.  

It, like many city buildings that were damaged, was reconstructed and is quite stunning. And Big. This is toward the chancel area. Nice stained glass and paintings of St Stephen.

And looking back towards the back. Yes, large as previously noted. Notice the organ pipes surrounding the window in the back. Also large.

Our hotel is just a few blocks away from St Stephens which puts us in the old part of the city and near the things we wanted to see.

The first morning here we went to see the practice sessions for the Spanische Hofreitschule (Spanish Riding School for our non - German reading public) - where the "famous" Lipizzaner stallions perform.

Starting at 9:00AM, each 30 minutes five or six horses are exercised/trained, then five or six more are brought in, progressively bringing in the better trained and older horses.

We went at 11:15 and saw the last half of one group and then all of the oldest and best trained horses being exercised/trained. I think the riders were also being exercised and trained. There was a coach, head trainer like guy standing in the middle quietly giving instructions to individuals and occasionally going over and meeting with horse and rider.

The horses are stunningly beautiful and more colorful than I had originally thought.

Coach guy for the moment addressing and looking at horses at the far end of the arena. We started in the upper deck and then as opportunity presented moved to a better viewing position for the rest of our time there.

These riding school is just part of a small, very small part, of one of the Hapsburg's family palaces -  the Imperial Palace. This place makes what the Medici's had in Florence look like a little ole fishing shack somewhere, (well perhaps I exaggerate just a little but this place is big and the horse stable and riding school are just a corner of a wing of one of the buildings. I couldn't even find it again.

I can also see why visiting dignitaries would think the White House was not such a big deal. But then we don't have Kings or Emperors, or at least not yet.

That is Frederick the First,  he was, as were several of the Hapsburgs, quite accomplished as generals and military leaders of a disparate set of nationalities in the Austrian-Hungarian Empire.  The kings saw themselves as defenders of the faith against Islam (and did fight the Ottoman Empire several times - Vienna was besieged more than once by the Turks).  

The Hapsburgs also were allies with or fought against almost every other power in Europe.  Their sons and daughters married other royal families as a matter of political expediency most of the time, but there were notable exceptions.

We are thinking of a new chandler and perhaps front entrance.

And adding to our art collection. The Hapsburgs liked art. We like art. I especially like the big battle scenes or "car chase art" as Linda called them when I pointed them out to her in Rome.

And this is the Picasso dove that became the Peace symbol on stamps and posters and became extremely popular during and after the first World Congress for Peace held in 1949.  The Hapsburg's collected some art.

And guess who went to Le Nozze di Figaro (Italian for The Marriage of Figaro). And at the National Opera House too. We both went to a concert introducing Viennese composers/music the previous evening. The music was by composers such as Mozart, Strauss, Hayden and Vivaldi and included some opera singing and ballet dancing. I was excited about seeing and hearing some more Viennese music.

The Opera house is, well, a bit like the Graham theater. The lobby is nice. The stairway to the upper level is a bit more than Grahams's but other than that….

They had no popcorn. 

My seat, not the front row, Patt did not come, not as enthused and it did make for a very late evening.  There were a lot of barrel chested guys singing what seemed like the same song and a lot of long haired women singing similar songs, a few of which were very pretty, some not so much. It did not end with a fat lady singing. There were no fat ladies, they seemed to be pretty, at least from my view, which was quite distant. It was actually more like North Hills Theater than Graham now that I think about ti.