Drinking the Waters of Karlovy Vary

Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic, was a slight detour on our way home.  We knew we wanted to check out one more place in Czech, and this one sounded interesting.  It is more of a spa town.  Known to have hot, mineral waters in the area.  The older (mostly Russian) visitor searches for the healing waters in which to soak in and drink.  We were only able to stay for a couple hours because we still had a 5 hour drive home. 

 

This is the Karlovy Experience...

 

First, buy a strange looking straw-for-a-handle mug at one of the many booths.

 

 

Gotta love the toilet shaped one.

Then, walk to one of the 11 fountains that are scattered throughout the River Walk area.  Some are fancy...

 

Some are plain...

 

 

Next, fill up your mug at the fountain.  It is hot.

 

Last, take a sip of the hot, mineral filled water.  (I think that it tasted like sucking on a hot penny.)

 



 

Share

with everyone. 

Repeat while walking through the town.

 

 

Along the River Walk of Karlovy Vary.

Looking for Bones in Kutna Hora, Czech Republic

 

Since we've been in Prague once before, we wanted to check out a few more Czech towns.  After a little research, I found the town of Kutna Hora about an hour east of Prague.  It was supposed to have a great church and a bunch of bones.  Sold!  The boys were excited.

 

Cute pink church, but no bones.

There was a problem with the water in this area because of all the mining.  They finally found a good spot to build a well.  An artist built this around it to make it beautiful.  It is the oldest of its kind.  Water, but no bones.

 

Wooden cat and Anya, no bones.

Another neat bridge with statues.  The Czech's know how to make awesome bridges. 

 

 

Check out this church.  No bones here.



The back has the "flying buttresses" like Notre Dame in Paris.

inside
 

Finally!  A church with bones, in a cemetery of course.

Urban myth has it that a monk went mad and made things from the bones, and there are stories to suggest that partially blind monks entrusted with the care of the chapel were the first to begin piling the bones into geometric shapes.

The decorations and sculptures were created though by a woodcarver named František Rint. In 1870, he was commissioned by the landowners of the time, the Schwarzenberg family, to decorate the chapel with the bones and create a reminder of the impermanence of human life and inescapable death.


 

It was creepy, but small.

 

 

A large "chandelier" that uses every bone in the body.

 

We love Prague when it is warm

Prague was our first  "European vacation" when we moved here.  It was November and cold and dark.  We still fell in love with Prague, but it instantly went back on our list to do again...when the sun is shining.  We don't have a very large re-do list because of the fact that there are about a billion places we want to see, and don't have the time to see even half of them.  Prague was about the only one we wanted to do again.  It all worked out perfectly because they also happened to have a night race through the Old Town.  Darin has had "run a cool race in Europe" (he ran a 1/2 marathon on Base and that really, really didn't count) on his While living in Europe Must-Do list.  We drove 6 hours, crossed a bunch off our lists, and had a fantastic time.  Early September couldn't bring better weather.

 

Prague's churches have the dual spires with the extra spikes.  Notice all the wires for the electric trains that the Soviets built all over the city.  They aren't pretty, but they are way efficient.  

I love the open market in the center of the Old Town.  Tons of booths with great stuff and great prices.  The Euro is about 25 of the CZK so that makes everything seem a bit more affordable.

 

Astronomical Clock

 

Check out the shoes on these Bohemian street performers 



Christian the horse.

 

Charles Bridge with the Prague castle in the background.

Darin before his race.  It was a night race and they lit up the city and had bands placed throughout the course.

 

Waiting for the race to start.  Entertaining themselves and everyone around them.  Finally we had to leave and just wander because they were so obnoxious, they only look normal.

 

Looking up Wenceslas Square

 

We positioned ourselves just before the finish line.  The boys were interested and we were looking forward to seeing just how many Africans came in before the rest of the European runners.  (Lots)  Anya was NOT enjoying this time. She was tired, and she was hungry. (We kind of forgot to feed the kids and they ended up eating at about 1030, Anya just ate fruit snacks and went to bed.)  Thankfully (?) this very loud and energetic band stopped Directly behind us and played and played.  Lots of dancing and singing and playing.  Fabulous distraction for a ornery toddler.  They played until after Darin had finished the race, so Anya was mesmerized for a long time and I could no longer hear...win for all.

Finish line.  Noah isn't a pirate, he just got knocked in the eye by a brother.

 

 

PIG

After the race we re-walked the city at night.  It was neat seeing it all lit up. 

 

 

 

 

We happened to be enjoying the Charles Bridge when an amazing firework show started.  It went on for a long time as the fireworks were being shot from two boats right below us and from the banks as well.  We don't know why there were fireworks, but we loved them. 

Taking the metro to find the local Prague branch for church.  It was a much bigger branch than we are attending.  We couldn't even find a single seat and waited in the hall.  Darin ran into some Russians who were visiting, but who had served their mission in St. Petersburg as well.  Darin loves the Czech Republic because he gets to speak  Russian all the time.

 

The last time we were in Prague we wished that we could have gone to a concert.  This time we took the kids to the Mirror Chapel, Mozart played here, to enjoy a great concert!  Brave, but with lots of suckers and tootsie rolls I was able to keep Anya quiet.

 

 

 

A quartet and an organ.  Beautiful.



 

 

The boys loved the concert.  Darin and I loved it too.  Successful night.

We had a wonderful revisit to Prague.  The only bad part was the apartment.  I am usually able to find decent apartments for us, but with the fab weather and the race going on (6500 runners) rooms were harder to come by.  I thought that I'd done Ok, but it turned out to be our dumpiest stay yet.  The door handles were falling off, the water taps would come off when the water was turned on.  The doors wouldn't shut.  The shower was tiny and without a curtain.  The bathroom was private, but located in a hall outside of the room.  We had the main train tracks out the back window and the main electric train tracks out the front window so it was always loud.  Good thing we didn't spend much time in the room, and most of the time we were laughing about it.   Good thing we see it as all part of the memories and the experience.