What a beautiful city – truly, unexpectedly stunning. I don’t know why but in my head it was a city that seemed a bit grey, but I went and was blown away by the gorgeous weather and the beautiful architecture on every corner of the street.
The city is reminiscent of a toy town, the pastel colours of the curvilinear forms on the facades of the buildings and the gothic churches with the spires interrupting the skyline is truly an amazing sight, especially at the top of the hill around the castle district. The many bridges across the city are beautiful in themselves, with Charles Bridge being a particularly popular one as it is filled with sculptures of saints watching down on you and contrasting against the bright blue sky. Another must see building is St Vitus cathedral – a monumental Gothic church with an intricately decorated facade and the inside is filled with the most wonderful stained glass that leaves you in awe and the rainbow of colour reflects on the cold stone walls.
The Opera house is decorated with a beautiful gold detailing on the roof and theatre is another prominent aspect of the culture. The museums were filled with Czech art as well as an all star cast, featuring Picasso, Klimt and Schiele, which I must admit almost brought me to tears. The standout museum for me was the Prague National Gallery (also called Trade Fair Palace), which showed 19th and 20th century art and currently shows some works by Ai Wei Wei, which runs until 17th January 2018.
There was a plethora of food options in the city and I wasn’t disappointed once. The stand outs were Bistro 19 which have a daily changing menu of a soup, main and dessert, a special shout out goes to the apple strudel which was wonderful and cinnamon filled (and a bargain for only £1); Sushi Maru which has an amazing eel, avocado and yellowtail roll. My favourite place had to be Cafe Lounge. There was a slight Secession/ Art Nouveau feel in the restaurant with the beautiful font and warm decoration within of brown leather chairs and slightly dimmed yellow lighting. The food was outstanding and really can’t find one fault, I highly recommend the quinoa salad with pomegranates, peppers and lambs lettuce which was fresh and light; marinated aubergine with pecorino, rocket and capers which was a salty delight and the aubergine which melted in your mouth; and the fried cod with chunky fries and homemade tartare sauce, the fish was so tender and the batter was light and fluffy. I’ve also heard great things about Cafe Louvre and of course the famous warm, fluffy, sweet, carby trdelnik.
Prague is definitely a place where I’ll be back and somewhere I would recommend to anyone for a short city break. Yes, there is a lot of walking on cobbled streets which definitely does make your thighs slightly stiff the next day but it’s 100% worth it for the beautiful views across the river and watching the sun set in the parks dotted around the city.