My Prague post

Recently Prague posts abound. Here is mine. Good memories from an unexpected concert trip four years ago.

Indeed I’ve been seeing many Prague posts lately, but the incentive to make my own came from a FB comment under another ten best European cities list. Let’s see if I can remember them all: Paris, London, Rome, Firenze, Venezia, Prague, Bruges, Vienna, Budapest, Salzburg. (The others I’ve seen but for some reason I have never been to Belgium. Why?) The comment said that Prague was overrated and didn’t deserve to be included in this list. That made me sad. My memory of it is splendid and not just on account of the occasion.

You know how sometimes, very rarely, you are offered a space in the car, a concert ticket and a hostel bed for three nights? In Prague, of all places? For PEARL JAM, of all bands? You don’t?

I snatched the offer faster than that time when I was invited to Los Angeles. In comparison, both invitations to visit Italy, the first one to visit, the second one to stay, were accepted only after MUCH more consideration. Even though Italy has three cities on that list! 😀

The fact that I had never met any of my fellow travellers to Prague before didn’t carry any weight. Any Pearl Jam fan is a friend of mine already.

Here are some views from our days. It was July, almost exactly four years ago then, and so hot that every late afternoon a heat storm broke out. (Photos enlarge upon clicking.)

I didn’t know yet that next year I’d be living in Italy.

My fellow travellers were very high-tech.

Kozel aka The Goat

Our hostel Kolbenka in a former industrial part of the city. An excellent bargain if you can take this exterior. Interior looks much nicer.

A lovely spot.

A lovely park.

Out of all trees – these are figs!

Rather aggressive.

The castle is certainly peculiar.

The change of guard.

It says Senate, so it must be it. It was just a practice, I think.

Grotto – dripstone wall plaque, Wallenstein Palace Garden.

“Beseda” means “word”, in Czech and Slovenian.

By the river.

We saw this island on the Vltava and had to go there immediately.

It was truly hot, and the river was cold.

Somebody complained about these blue boats. I don’t know, they didn’t bother me.

It was a very calm scene.

Ducks and all.

We went to the rock club Ujezd, but only during the day.

This church was designed by Slovenian architect Jože Plečnik. Looks mightily Monty Python to me.

I think I was dehydrated.

And my feet were hurting.

The Good Soldier Švejk is represented.

Underground station.

Leaving here. Good-bye, hostel and Prague and PJ. Until we meet again.

Photo: a © signature mmm production

The fact that X played as the opener was another unexpected treat. It was the happiest crowd and the coolest vibe out of all my now already nine Pearl Jam shows. Well, I tend to say yes. Here is a fun post from my first blog showing you my world destinations in the first map and PJ shows in the second.

And here is the full Pearl Jam show for the memories and the curious. One of fully unexpected benefits of the internet if you asked me years ago – to be able to relive a show in its entirety.

And in case you are wired differently, or even if you’re not, here is some Smetana (in my language it means “Cream”) with his famous composition on the theme of Prague’s river Vltava.