Just returned from 3 night break in Prague, overall impression very favourable. Didn%26#39;t meet one grouchy person all the time we were there - from arrival at the airport to the hotel (Kinksy Gardens - v. good) to bar/restaurant staff - all friendly, not sure if we were lucky or that as we smile at people and say please and thank you a lot, they returned the favour.
Were lucky with the weather, blue skies and sunshine so saw Prague at its best. The Old Town Square, Castle, Charles Bridge etc etc stunning especially when illuminated at night. Hordes of daytime tourists seemed to thin out a bit at night which was good.
Negatives - too much traffic (and noisy on cobbles) and too many tacky souvenir shops/stalls. Saw only one hen party group, very well behaved in the old town square about 11 pm, no problem at all. No beery lads about - too close to Christmas perhaps. Final negative - the historical old part of Prague is the jewel of the city, the rest has nice buildings but at times you could be anywhere, McDonalds and KFC everywhere. When we pulled up at our hotel there was a huge Tesco sign, we were 3 mins from an enormous Tesco hypermarket + M%26amp;S and Next in the shopping mall too - we were not expecting to see that in Prague !
Christmas markets - old town square one disappointing, loads of tat, but took the advice of previous poster and headed to more locals type market at Namesti Miru, small but some better quality goods. There are other smaller Xmas markets dotted about too. Jazz band, carol singers and so on in the Old Square made for a good atmosphere though.
Security - we felt completely safe in Prague during our whole visit. The first night we strolled into town from our hotel in Praha 5 (about 20 mins from Charles Bridge) and stayed in town until gone midnight, walked home and did not feel threatened at all. We noticed lone women walking about early - mid evening in the dark seemingly fine about it. Last night we walked home from the Old Town again gone midnight with no problem whatsoever. Didn%26#39;t see any pick pocketing incidents on our travels, few Police about considering the number of tourists. The only Police we met was when our mad taxi driver got caught for speeding, they stopped the car and our journey was abandoned !
Needless to say, price of beer unbelievable, and good beer too.
Finally, and sorry if this is too long, Kampa Park Restaurant on our final night was fantastic. Location on the riverside terrace, food, service all wonderful. You need to budget about £50 - £60 per head including wine (although you could obviously spend a lot more) but as an experience dining overlooking the river and Charles Bridge at night, it was really brilliant. (NB we booked it on the net, and took our confirmation e-mail along which was just as well as the restaurant manager (?) couldn%26#39;t find our reservation at first and said were we sure we had booked the riverside terrace ? He was slightly superior but the other staff were lovely).
Hope some of this may be of use to first time visitors - Prague is well worth a visit and we had a great time.
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very interesting report, glad you enjoyed,bet you are now thinking of another visit
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really funny how an english person complains that prague is ruined by .... wait for it .. shops, and English shops too.
And we have too many cars - well there are about 2 million people living in and around the capital city. Another condescending post from a visitor to eastern europe who is surpised that people here don%26#39;t live in caves and wear skins.
Which country was the one that was blocking the Czech republic and others from joining Schengen - the UK, and with that attitude of people from this region being second class EU citizens, it is no wonder why.
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come on peb, have a cup of coffee and lighten up, it was only his opinion
dave
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Oh dear, I didn%26#39;t mean to offend but was trying to give a balanced view on what we saw. I hope the positives outweighed the negatives as we liked Prague very much. As for second class citizens, we thought how prosperous the inhabitants seemed to be, including some very well dressed ladies in particular - the shopping mall where Tesco%26#39;s is was full of seemingly prosperous locals. When I referred to English shops being there, I didn%26#39;t mean it in a derogatory way but that we weren%26#39;t expecting to see Tesco there. So I%26#39;m sorry you took offence at what was supposed to be a helpful post to other Brits who may be going to Prague.
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I had to look Schengen up on the net as I hadn%26#39;t heard of it, for those who also don%26#39;t know what it means it was an EU agreement in 1985 which concerned the free movement of people in to EU states at the time. Apparently the UK did not agree to the constitution proposed - but some 20 years later we have the most liberal policy going with no restrictions on people coming in to the UK - 500,000 - 1,000,000 in the past 2 years (no-one knows how many really) and no other country in the EU has allowed this !! So I think we have well and truly made up for Schengen now !
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Nice report. Thanks a lot.
(I did not take offense in the name of the Eastern countries here, but sometimes the conception of our region as being third world is unnerving.)
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also. it is governments who make decisions about things like border controls, not individuals. I will not criticise anyoe personally for the decisions their government makes (as long as they are not head of state), and expect the same in return (until I am head of state) :D
(that was an election broadcast of behalf of....)
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Peb
I think your posts on this site are priceless and I have benefitted from them, but I think you have got it wrong this time.
I think the White family expected big department stores in Prague but maybe the Czech equivalent of Tesco%26#39;s Next etc.
Cheers
Davie
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like in britain we have the british version of american chains like macdonalds and kfc, or the british version of swedish chains like H%26amp;M and ikea... or
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I am genuinely regretting posting this report on Prague as it seems to have encouraged negative views which is the opposite of what was intended. I think the British are probably more used to accepting negatives as well as positives and perhaps I have misjudged the sensitivities of other nationalities on this occasion.
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