Things to do in Prague

curlytop006

MALA STRANA! From the Old Town, cross the river at Charles Bridge, you will arrive at a beautiful area called Mala Strana. Explore its narrow side-streets on foot. It's like a fairytale, chocolate-box picture, especially if it snows. Pastel-coloured buildings, ten times prettier than Wencelas Square or the Old Town. Restaurants, hotels and bars in this area can be a little pricier, but are worth it. The BlueLight bar is small but has terrific character - expect to spend a lot of time staring at the walls .... you'll see what I mean when you get there. Oh you've made me wanna go now!

Darkphaery

jenny-wren
Me too. Any hints or tips would be greatly appreciated.

I'm particularly interested in whether anyone can recommend a nice place close to the Old Town Square for traditional Czech food (and a few beers!) that won't break the bank.

Hi Jenny

There's a lovely place right on the Old Town Square, it's called Staromestska Restaurace, they do lots of lovely food with quite a bit of variets (as i am quite picky about meat) they have tables outside with heaters for you to sit and watch the world go by, it's cheaper to sit inside though and still a nice atmosphere. Even though it's right on the Square its very well priced. We usually have 2 main meals, 2 puds a couple of wines and a couple of beers for around £17!!! I got married in Prague in 2005 and love the place so much i have been back 5 times (with another trip planned for August as i have never been when it's warm:rolleyes:) We go to this restaurant again and again, so well worth a visit in my opinion :beer:

Any

jenny-wren wrote: »

Me too. Any hints or tips would be greatly appreciated.

I'm particularly interested in whether anyone can recommend a nice place close to the Old Town Square for traditional Czech food (and a few beers!) that won't break the bank.

Loads.
My OH's favourite is Bredovsky Dvur on Politickych veznu street.
Near Wenceslav square http://bredovskydvur.unas.cz/poloha.htm

lufcgirl

Thank you again for all the wonderful advice. I'll certainly post back with how it went when I'm home again!

I've made a list of stuff from here and I'll be sure to tick things off!

colinw

zenmaster wrote: »

I was going to suggest that (looking at the OPs avatar ). The big famous one is at Kutna Hora (careful how you say that!) and is amazing. You can get a train (1hr) or bus (1hr 15min) but it's well worth the trip. A few more things to do in Kutna Hora here on Frommers. Frommers also do a few walking tours which you can copy into Word and print out. As I recall we combined a couple of them to make a full day. Even if you don't do the recommended walks there is some interesting imformation there.

We went to Kutna Hora as well. I would recommend that and as others have said the castle is worth a visit. Have fun

lufcgirl

Well I got back on the 19th so thought I'd give an update on how it went!

Hotel was 350 crowns from the centre, room was full of smoke and unhabitable. When we threatened to leave they changed the room. I couldn't believe you could just smoke in bars and restaurants, it's so ignorant. And it's generally the English and Irish that do it as they see it as a novelty! Because of this, we went to Caffreys for two of the days around 11.30am (because it was empty) for lunch and then the last day we found another Irish bar in Wencelas Square to get lunch early too to try and avoid the smokers.
Because of this, we didn't even risk eating out on a night, we just bought a KFC and took it to the hotel and watched DVD's (boring old couple!)

It was freezing, a totally different type of cold to here. I had three pairs of socks and two pairs of gloves on and I couldn't stand the cold still! I loved the markets in Old Town Square, very Christmassy. Wencelas Square was ok-ish too. Because of the cold we couldn't really go that many outdoorsy places. We did go to Charles Bridge and the John Lennon Wall, and found an antique shop with a book on Newcastle in which was a fab find!

The final straw came when we got a taxi from Old Town Square to the Palladium (10 min taxi ride) and the driver tried to charge us the equivalent of £40! So we challenged it, gave him a 2000 krone note and got Hungarian money the equivalent of £3 back (it was dark so I just put the change back in my purse and didn't realise)

So all in all I wasn't really impressed with the place, if it was warmer I would've loved to have explored more. But the whole smoking and taxi driver thing put me massively off the place.

GlennTheBaker

Sounds like you should have just stayed at home. You surely didn't expect it to be anything other than bloody freezing in the middle of December? As for taking taxis everywhere, that's just ridiculous. Wenceslas Square to Old Town Square is a 15 min walk at the most and Old Town Square to the Palladium is less than 10 mins.

What on earth did you do in this country before the smoking ban in pubs and restaurants? Did you eat at KFC all the time? I also find it a bit odd that you went to only a couple of Irish bars and yet seemed to be actively avoiding English and Irish people because of them smoking.

Next time you go somewhere, leave the DVD player at home, be prepared to do a bit of walking and open your mind.

lufcgirl

GlennTheBaker wrote: »

Sounds like you should have just stayed at home. You surely didn't expect it to be anything other than bloody freezing in the middle of December? As for taking taxis everywhere, that's just ridiculous. Wenceslas Square to Old Town Square is a 15 min walk at the most and Old Town Square to the Palladium is less than 10 mins.

What on earth did you do in this country before the smoking ban in pubs and restaurants? Did you eat at KFC all the time? I also find it a bit odd that you went to only a couple of Irish bars and yet seemed to be actively avoiding English and Irish people because of them smoking.

Next time you go somewhere, leave the DVD player at home, be prepared to do a bit of walking and open your mind.

Firstly, I walked from Wencelas Square to Old Town Square, if you don't have a clue where anything is the general opinion is to get a taxi, you don't expect to be ripped off. I agree about the cold, I just didn't realise how bad it would be!

Before the smoking ban was introduced, I didn't eat out. Simple as. You really think I want to eat with people smoking right next to me?!

I did plenty of walking, I loved Charles Bridge and Old Town Square and the Astronomical Clock Tower. Because of the weather, which was snowstorms a lot of the time, we didn't get to go to the places we would have liked to. So were going to go back in the summer when it's a lot lot warmer and get to do more exploring!

GlennTheBaker

lufcgirl wrote: »

Firstly, I walked from Wencelas Square to Old Town Square, if you don't have a clue where anything is the general opinion is to get a taxi, you don't expect to be ripped off. I agree about the cold, I just didn't realise how bad it would be!

Before the smoking ban was introduced, I didn't eat out. Simple as. You really think I want to eat with people smoking right next to me?!

I did plenty of walking, I loved Charles Bridge and Old Town Square and the Astronomical Clock Tower. Because of the weather, which was snowstorms a lot of the time, we didn't get to go to the places we would have liked to. So were going to go back in the summer when it's a lot lot warmer and get to do more exploring!

Fair enough Sorry if my original post came across a bit harsh

Bean_Counter

We are just back from Prague, having gone from the 20th to the 23rd.

I must say that I found it a stunning city and a real joy to go round. The buildings are fantastic. With regard to the cold, it was a bit parky when we got there (-13C) although did get a bit milder over the next couple of days so the cold wasn't really an issue. It was -11C when we got back to Scotland.

I hadn't realised just what a compact city it was and had walked from the hotel to the Old Town Square, then to the Castle, Wenceslas Square and back to the Old Town Square in the first morning. The Christmas markets were excellent and a really good atmosphere.

As for the smoking, we found that most places had no smoking parts, which whilst not great, was bearable. We did rush a couple of meals to get out of places.

Oh and Glenn, the hotel you recommended was fantastic.

The only downside was that the flights were delayed four hours on the way out and six hours on the way back which impacted some of our plans but not much we could do about that.

Overall we really enjoyed Prague and would recommend it.