More Prague's Municipal House

Prague's Municipal House

Prague's Municipal House is a major civic, cultural and historic landmark. It opened in 1912 amidst nationalistic fervor. In 1918, its Smetana Concert Hall was the site of the proclamation of the new Czechoslovakia. For anyone interested in Art Nouveau, I suppose, it is Mecca. Vicki and I did our own little tour in 2010, peering in through windows and doors, gawking at the beauty, but not really understanding what we were looking at. This time, however, we took the English tour, which was marvelous. The tour goes from the Smetana Concert Hall, through several ladies' lounges, another small concert hall, then into several formal rooms, the Mayor's Hall, featuring much Mucha, another concert hall, and then ends in the several opulent restaurants on the ground floor and in the basement. I will post some photos here in two posts, but leave them without comment, at least for the present. The objects of beauty sort of speak for themselves.

Prague Scenes

Our next stop was Prague. Rebecca and Jeremy had rented a 3 bedroom apartment in the "new" town (1358), a couple blocks from the "dancing building" (known to some as "Fred and Ginger") and the river. All five of us stayed there several days, with the camper stored very conveniently at our old campground, Camping Drusus, west of Prague. We cooked some in, ate some out, and took in a variety of sights all over the great city.

I posted extensively from Prague in 2010. The old city is a very beautiful place, especially if you like Art Nouveau, and so I was tempted to go out and see and photograph everything all over again. In part, I did. But I won't post it all over again, hoping mostly to confine myself to a few new things Vicki and I did. For more pix, see my posts from late August, 2010.

Fred and Ginger

Rebecca's and Jeremy's apartment building
on Dittrichova street

Not Art Nouveau: some nice Social Realism just down the
street

Just a block away, at a church, a shrine to the Czech and
Slovak partisans who parachuted back in to then
Czechoslovakia in 1942 and assassinated Reinhard Heydrich,
Nazi governor of Czechoslovakia and thought by some to be
Hitler's heir; the partisans and their protectors, including a
bishop, as I recall, were all killed; and the village of Lidice
was razed in reprisal, all its male inhabitants executed and its
women and children sent to death camps; Heydrich was chief
architect of much of what was most evil about Nazism...

The commemorative plaque; we were there just a day or
two after the June 18th observance

The bar across the street; another way of remembering...

Sunday afternoon on the Charles River

A peek into the old Jewish cemetery in the Josefov

The great Czech restaurant up by the castle, U Labuti,
where we all had dinner one night

Rebecca, Jeremy, and Penelope, on the castle
grounds

Up in Hradcany castle, the Golden Lane, which was closed
when Vicki and I were there in 2010

Tower by the Municipal House (next post)

View of St. Vitus' Church, from the apartment on
Dittrichova

Just one of the great old buildings (I can't help myself!)

Return to Dresden

We visited Dresden in 2010 (see many posts August, 2010) and were sufficiently impressed to suggest that Rebecca and Jeremy make it part of their tour. We were all there two days.

At the stellplatz, the owner spotted Penelope and presented her with a dump
truck to pull around the yard

Vicki visited the Green Vaults with Rebecca and Jeremy while I watched
Penelope; next day, we all got out and I took some pix of Dresden en route to
the Gemaldegalerie; here, the Semperoper, that is, the Dresden opera,
designed by Gottfried Semper

August the Strong

Rebecca, Jeremy, and Penelope before the Dresden cathedral

The Elbe, not nearly as high as in 2010

Rafael's Sistine Madonna was its own special exhibition at
the Gemaldegalerie this summer

Berlin: Out-takes

Looking for some Impressionist painting
at the Altesmuseum, we came upon this 
portrait of Wagner...by Lembach?

And a not quite as famous bust of Wagner

Outside, in the former Soviet zone, some
really nice Social Realism

Berlin cathedral on a beautiful Sunday afternoon

"Never, ever, appear before me with glad tidings when I'm
on the crapper!"

Capitalism

The 2012 Euro fussball contest continued; Germany made
it into the final four; fussball fans here are no less crazy than
their counterparts in the US

My favorite eating establishment in Berlin...

Marian's Imbiss, Tegel; I could eat currywurst und frites
und bier 3 or 4 times a week; and did

Monday morning Rebecca, Jeremy, and Penelope arrived,
and, after the usual luggage mishap (resolved), we drove
them to their hotel, the Westin Grand Berlin (right on Unter
den Linden); I couldn't resist driving right up to the front,
horrifying the bell-persons...

And returned to Wohnmobil Berlin, now with Penelope, her
clothes, food, toys, books, and play-pen/crib; she was a
tired baby, but seemed happy to see us