June 28, 2022

We were very exciting going to another new country - the Czech Republic. But it was a long travel day, and the train ride from Budapest to Prague, the Czech Republic, took more than seven hours. Since it was raining in the morning, the taxi took a while to show up. Fortunately, the train station is not very far, and it didn't delay that much. We had booked a direct train from Budapest to Prague, but a section of the railway in the middle was washed away by a mudslide a few days ago, and the bus transferred the passengers to bypass the damaged railway section. As we got off the bus, a policeman shouted "passport, passport" to the crowd. We didn't have the passports in hand. When we tried to get our passports, the police officers just waved to let us go without checking the passports. We saw two passengers get arrested because they didn't have the documents. It was the first time we had witnessed such an event in the past 40 days in Europe, and we had crossed the border multiple times. It seemed that the border inspection was profile targeting.

We arrived at Prague's central train station after five in the afternoon and called Uber to get us to our hotel apartment in the old town center. Part of the old town area was pedestrian-only, and no cars were allowed. After getting off the Uber, we had to drag our suitcase through the cobblestone street, which was not easy. Besides the bedroom, the apartment had a large living room, small kitchen, and washer machine, but we later discovered it didn't have AC, and they gave us two fans to cool the rooms down. The apartment was next to a busy alley and was noisy during the day. However, the location was perfect.

After settling in, we walked to the old town square nearby, just in time for the Prague Astronomical Clock to announce the hour. The clock was a medieval astronomical clock attached to the Old Town Hall and was first installed in 1410, making it the third-oldest astronomical clock in the world and the oldest clock still in operation. There were hundreds of people anxiously waiting for the twelve Jesus apostles to appear one by one out of two small doors on the clock. The whole sequence lasted about a few minutes.

After another vegan dinner, we went to the famous Charles Bridge, which was overcrowded. We were uncomfortable with the large crowd, so we left the bridge and returned to the square. There were several food booths, and when we saw big ham being grilled on the stall, our appetite was up again. The ham was sold by weight, starting with 100 grams. We couldn't hold it back and asked for some, which tasted good. Our first impression of Prague was good.

欧洲游第三十九天：今天又要去一个新的国家-捷克🇨🇿。从布达佩斯坐火车到捷克的布拉格(Prague)要七个多小时，早上起来下雨了，下雨天叫出租车有些难，还好没耽搁太久，且火车站也不是很远。我们订的是直达的火车，但中间有一段铁路前些天被泥石流冲毁了，只能用汽车来代替。铁路公司安排了大巴🚌将我们从一辆火车送到另一辆。有点吃惊的是刚下大巴就有二名乘客因为没有护照而被抓，来欧洲近四十天还是第一次碰到，但并没有查我们，看来边境检查是有针对性的。下午五点多到了布拉格，叫Uber 来到老城中心的小旅馆，也带厨房的。在安顿好了之后就走去旁边的老城广场，正好赶上天文钟整点报时，精彩点是十二位耶稣使徒们一个个在两个小门里出现。饭后又去了著名的查理大桥，桥上人满为患，匆匆走了一遍。回到布拉格广场看到小摊上正烤着火腿时，食欲又来了，实在是憋不住，要了一百克火腿，味道还真好。对布拉格第一印象不错。