Europe Trip - Day 9

June 23, 2010

Today we have 6 hours of walking tours planned. We met up with our local guide; a slavik lady - I did not catch her name. We toured the Castle Prague and it was amazing.

We came back across the Charles Bridge to Old Town for lunch. We watched the Clock Tower again. It is amazing with the twelve disciples parading by two windows then a skeleton ringing the bell signifying the end of time and Judgement Day. All this ends with a rooster crowing the start of a new day; defying death. Then a trumpeter plays momenti mori from the top of the church. A big crowd gathers every hour on the hour.

Lunch was at a pizzeria and it was excellent. We ended up there for dinner as well.

We took a walking tour of Jewish Old Town after lunch. The first synagogue was powerful in that it had the names of the 75,000 Jewish people killed at the Terezin concentration camp etched in the walls. The elders in the camp taught the children and kept artwork that the children created while they were in the camp. This artwork was saved and was on display. It was amazing. One of the sections of artwork was labeled "Transport to Terror"...

Many children died in the camps. Just horrible.

We also walked through a Jewish cemetary where bodies were burried 12 graves deep due to land limitations in the Jewish section.

After the tour we returned to Old Town and Brittany and I enjoyed World Cup Soccer with the big crowd while the girls shopped.

After dinner at the pizzeria Brittany and I headed off to find St. Martins Kirche. We knew that Brittany's friend Emily Coleman was going to Europe with her college choir and I had learned they were going to be in Prague our last night there. When Brittany and I got to where we thought the church was (reading a map in Czech can be fairly difficult) we saw flyers advertising Malone College and knew we were in the right place! Almost immediately we saw a large group heading towards the church and Brittany said it's them! And there came Emily. It was a great meeting...Emily was in tears! We got to talk and then watched part of their concert before we had to head back to our main group. The choir was amazing!

When we got back we found out that one of the shop workers (Alexander) had been flirting with Kelsey and gave her a beautiful swan. I should not have left her side! Just kidding.

We spent some time at Starbucks and Alyssa was on a roll. So funny! Brittany and I went out to the square and found David, our tour guide from the ghost tour, and we got pictures of him and Alyssa. Priceless!

Our trip is coming to a rapid end...