The Prague castle is actually a huge complex, but the castle
itself is rather small. Inside the complex is: the royal palace, St. Vitus
Cathedral, St. George’s Basilica, and Golden Lane.
We went into all but St. George’s Basilica.
The Royal Palace surprised me most by its modesty. For a
city as opulent as Prague I had expected the opulence to continue into the palace.
It wasn’t dull but it wasn’t as decorative as other places we had seen. The
ceiling was really impressive. The way the vaulted arches were done in the
throne room in particular was quite the feat. Vaulted arches in general were
designed to help provide an open floor plan with only a few columns leaving a
large center space in the room. The ceiling in the throne room had vaulted
arches, but instead of leading to a seemingly triangular point, the center
seemed to create a sort of dome eliminating the need for as many columns so
there were even fewer than normal.
The Golden Lane is an alley that at its widest is 8 feet
wide and at its narrowest was 4 feet wide. It was an area that housed people
who worked in the castle complex. The houses were extremely tiny, and the doors
were all very small, I had to duck to get into a few. There was even a door
Abby was too tall for. It made her day. Franz Kafka lived in one of the houses
on the lane briefly in 1917. Shortly after all the houses on the lane were bought
by the city and the lane is now preserved to look as it would have during the
16th century. It was very claustrophobic, but it was cooler than the
palace.
From the castle complex we walked back to the apartment to
get Michaela (the woman whose apartment we were staying at), her advice on
where to watch the Czech vs Portugal game that night. We found a place, and
Czech lost. We’re starting to think we might be cursed, or we are good luck
charms for Portugal because they beat Czech Republic and Holland when we were
watching the games.
No comments:
Post a Comment