WET WEDNESDAY IN PRAGUE.....

Yes, it's still raining!

This is what we saw when we looked out our living room window this morning:

And you will notice a "sea of umbrellas" in almost every picture I took today:

We were awake quite early this morning--5 a.m., but lazed around for a few hours waiting and hoping the rain would stop--but no such luck.  So we donned our raincoats and grabbed our umbrellas, and just got on with our day.  I'm sure we won't melt---but I am getting a bit tired of the rain!

We started about 10 am, and took the metro to a stop near old town.  We walked in the rain, with several other umbrella carrying tourists, towards Old Town Square and Old Town Hall with it's Astronomical Clock.  

Right next to Old Town Hall we saw this amazing building:

Close up of the scenes:

Old Town Hall, dating to 1364

Astronomical Clock, dating to 1410.  In the two widows above the top dial, the twelve apostles make their appearance on the hour.  In the small window above these, a rooster crows.

The clock bell rings every hour, and the animated figures on either side of the lower dial come to life, with the grinning skeleton (death) striking the time, as depicted by his hourglass.  It's quite a show!

We were able to climb the bell tower, and the view from the top was incredible.

St Nicholas Church:

Our Lady Before Tyn Church:

And here we are at the top:

Even though we climbed up the tower, we took the elevator down--much easier on my knees!

After climbing the tower we looked through some of the rooms in the Old Town Hall.  

This meeting room had beautiful Gothic style ceilings, with gorgeous mosaic art work:

After our time at Town Hall, we visited St. Nicholas Church (1755):

The interior is wonderful, especially the huge chandelier:

Of course, I loved the front door!

Neat door pull:

We continued to wander around the old town area, and soon came to the Powder Tower, one of the 13 original gates to the city, which dates back to 1476.  Today cars zip through the archway at the bottom of the tower!

Municipal House, a fairly new building which opened in 1912, now hosts classical concerts:

Pretty mosaic work below the dome:

We walked on a little farther, and just happened to look into a small square, and spotted a farmer's market.  Of course we had to take a quick stroll through!

Farmer's Market:

Besides food and produce, there were several booths selling locally made handicrafts, such has handwoven items, pottery and jewelry:

Great looking produce:

Matt--it's your favorite veggie--Kapusticky!

We noticed a vendor selling hot black current wine--just what we needed to warm us up on this cold, drizzly day.  It was so delicious that we went back for a second cup.  AND then we went back and bought a whole bottle to have later.  Mmmmmmm,  seriously good stuff!

It was after lunch time, so we decided to share a grilled sausage with mustard, we chose wild boar sausage and it was really tasty.  While we ate our lunch we had a nice chat with a couple from northern Germany.

After our sausage and wine we walked around the market some more, choosing a couple of small deserts to try--the apple strudel was yummy.

We left the market and roamed around a several block area.   A couple of antique shops caught my eye,  so of course I needed to spend some time poking around.  Didn't buy a thing, but it's always fun to look.

We came across this lovely old church, The Church of St Peter Na Porici, dating to the 1300's.  We would have loved to take a peek inside, but all the doors were locked:

St. Peter's has a separate bell tower, built in the late 1500's.  It has a walk-thru from the street into the church yard:

A few blocks later we saw a sign in a window that said "30 Beers On Tap"--and decided that it was important for us to get out of the rain!  We shared 5 small "tasters" and a pretzel.  The beers were all good, and we're thinking we'll go back again for another tasting!

After our beer tasting, we wandered for another hour or so, enjoying all the beautiful architecture.  Here are a couple of high-lights:

It was now almost 5 pm, and we'd wandered around Old Town for hours!  We were planning on having dinner at a nice restaurant we'd spotted earlier, but it was still too early to eat.  We decided we'd go back to the apartment, unload our bags, and rest up a bit before heading back out.

Well--------we took the loooong way home (also known as getting lost and walking around in circles!)

We were both wet and tired, so we changed our dining "out" plans to dining "in"!  We took the metro home, and I cooked a simple meal of pasta with meat sauce.

We're now all snuggled in our warm and DRY apartment, relaxing and listening to the rain.  

Tomorrow in Prague,  rain or shine:  The Prague Castle and The Strahov Monastery and Brewery, and hopefully NOT in the rain!