I heart Praha

While, its a little behind schedule, I couldn't let this last blog post go unwritten, especially because it's of our favorite town, Prague.  Jon and I were delighted to have a homecoming to this sweet city and to find ourselves feeling like we'd never left. 

We arrived late on Thursday night, so we headed straight to Standa and Dita's apartment, enjoyed a little BBQ and then crashed.  We spent all day Friday exploring the city and visiting some of our favorites.  Here are some of the highlights.

back in old town square

the crazy long escalators of the metro

one of our favorite coffee places...coffee heaven

our very favorite restaurant, hany bany (pronounced honey bunny)

We spent the afternoon at the Veletrzní palác.
This is Prague's modern art museum, and was one of Jon's favorite places to go.

a bike?

photography exhibition

famous muchas

From there, we headed to our old neighborhood, Vinohrady.  But first, we stopped by the hotel that Standa used to work out in Malastrana, and the place where he and Dita first met.

pension dientzenhofer

back at namesti miru, theater in the back ground

on the steps of the old cathedral

our old apartment building, 34 Římská

From there we headed to our favorite park, Riegrovy Sady and had a special snack box prepared for us of Chlebíčky, traditional Czech open face sandwiches, from the best place in town to get them Jan Paukert.

my favorite view of the city from riegrovy sady

yum!

After our little snack we walked around and then hopped on a tram to get dinner!  Standa and Dita did not let us go hungry once!  It was so fun just wandering around, I have so many fond memories just taking walks around the town and stopping as we needed to.  We walked by Dita's office, overlooking the beautiful paradise park.

water feature of paradise park

playing around in the park

on our way to dinner, crossing the charles bridge

and of course, the tram ride home

one last cozy night in standa and dita's apartment

Standa and Dita were such amazing hosts, we felt so lucky to be able to stay with them and spend so much time together!  Hopefully we'll see each other in  another two years!

and of course the sent us off with one last meal, traditional czech breakfast of bread, cheese and meat!  so delicious!

most favorite of all, camembert!

So, this will be last the last post of our travels.  Its been so fun to share it with you all!  Thanks for following along.  Jon and I have arrived safely back in Portland and are readjusting to our lives here.  Stay tuned for our next adventures....

Update - Uncle Standa's music video from 1982

This was the one of the songs that was performed at the wedding from when Dita's uncle was much younger and liked to wear delicious 1980s costumes.  The choreography from the dance the groom's friends put on at the reception (that Jon also took part in, see below) is based loosely on the dancing in the video.  Enjoy!

Kotvald a Hložek - Holky z naší školky

Ciao Bella!

Because we were in Europe, had a rental car, and a few days without a specific itinerary, we simply could not resist the urge to head south once again to Italy. So early on Tuesday morning, we hit the road and made our way up and over the Alps into Italy. Part of the motivation for the long car ride was sparked because Jon's cousin has been stationed in Vicenza for the past three years and we were about the catch them during their last week before they headed back to the US.

out to dinner with Aly and Zack

After 9 hours of driving we arrived in Vicenza! Jon's cousin Aly, and her husband Zack took us out to their favorite restaurant. It's just hard to go wrong with Italian food. Truffles are the specialty of that region, so we enjoyed some decadent Italian cuisine, followed by gelato, of course! 

We also good advantage of the fact we were 45 minutes away from Venice and spent a few hours wandering around the easy-to-get-lost-on streets, eventually finding all the major bridges, Piazza San Marco and topping it off with a ride on the Venice public transit system (based on ferries, not trains) down the grand canal.

lovin' the beautiful and charming venice

the rialto bridge in the background

looking out from piazza san marco

on the rialto

public transit ride

From there we headed north back into the Alps, close to Austrian-Italian border (which has shifted many times over the years leaving it an interesting mesh of Ger-talian style). We found a home for a night in the sleepy mountain town of Merano, a place described by Jon's cousin Aly, as the "garden of eden", and it was indeed. Since we had been staying with friends a few nights we decided to splurge a little on accommodations, and stayed at a beautiful hotel with amazing views of the Alps and the town below. We spent that morning at the hot springs that the town is known for, which was the perfect way to unwind for the morning before we hit the road and headed Northeast back to Prague. 

view from the hotel julianne

merano

the outdoor portion of the hot springs had pools of all different temperatures and you can see how it runs right into this pond with the cute little turtles.

the indoor section of the hot springs

Relaxing in Rusava

After the wedding we headed to Dita's family cottage.  It was built by her grandfather, which is very common for that era, since travel to non-communist countries was limited.  The cottage is super cozy, and we were surrounded by beautiful green lush hillsides. 

Dinner out with Standa and Dita close to their cottage in Rusava.



hanging out at the cottage

After relaxing on Sunday, Standa and Dita took us to Ruznov, a reconstruction of a Moravian town circa the 1600s from some original buildings that were moved to the town and some that were built in the original style. 



The church in Ruznov, everything was made of wood

We met Dita's sister, Ivona and family and another friend for lunch and went to check out the home their friends are building (pictured on the far right with their son). 

Here is the whole gang



 Then we drove up to top of the hill and hiked up to see the Radegast, a mythical figure that protected this region against invaders.


Jon with the Radegast.



Standa giving little Petr a ride (Ivona's son)



The gorgeous forests of moravia in the background

 
After hiking around, we headed back to cabin for our last night in Moravia.  We cooked up some delicious food and went to bed full and happy. Standa and Dita are such great hosts and were so generous to let us stay with them.  As we have experienced before on this trip, being able to stay with people who know the area so nice, we never would have discovered Ruznov on our own. 

Jon and Standa grilling up some mushroms, chicken and camembert...yum!

On Tuesday morning we woke up early and hit the road finding our way south all the way to Northern Italy, where we spent the night with Jon's cousin and her husband in Vicenza.  Today we are going to check out Venice and then head to the Alps, then back to Prague on Thursday.  Much more to come...

Standa + Dita

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so rather than trying to describe the whole wedding day, hopefully I can take you through it in photos rather than lengthy descriptions. 

Our day began with finding a boot on our car because we did not know we had to pay for parking.  Fortunately the police officer took pity on us and was extra friendly when he saw that Jon had a Czech name.

We met Standa at the Castle and we all headed down to the wedding together.  The castle gardens are famous and beautifully manicured...we only caught a little glimpse of the, but what we saw was amazing.

Everyone attending the wedding received these little boutonnieres, that are symbols of good luck.

The ceremony was held in this gorgeous baroque style room.  Here is Standa and his mother walking down the aisle.

Dita and her father make their entrance.

During the ceremony, Dita's nephews were playing around in the aisle, they were so cute! Their father is British, and the eldest son who is four came up to his dad (standing behind Dita on the right) and said loudly, "Daddy, if I'm good, can I go to the aquapark?" When his dad tried to tell him to be quite because his Aunty Dita was getting married, he said, "Daddy, I'm talking to you!"  These darlings boys reminded me so much of my own nephews and how cute they were during our own ceremony.

After the ceremony, they had the receiving line and we got to give Standa and Dita some big American hugs.  Upon exciting we throw rice on them, just like in the US...a familiar tradition!

This on the other hand was not such a familiar tradition...Standa was greeted by his new sister in laws and her eldest sister's husband and was giving several tasks, including hammering nails, raking up money, chugging beer and catching a live rabbit! All of these are associated with the Moravian countryside, where Dita is originally from.

Lastly, Standa was officially yoked by his new wife, Dita.

Sealed with a kiss.

From there, we all caravaned together to the Hotel Rusava, in the small town of Rusava about 20 minutes from Kromeriz. We were included with the lunch, that is usually just for family, so we felt very lucky and honored to be counted among their closest relatives.  Here Standa and Dita are feeding each other traditional wedding soup.

We got one formal picture of us together with Standa and Dita, just like we had at our wedding.

After lunch and photos, we had a little break before the official reception started.  Dita's uncle, Standa Hložek was a famous popstar from the 80s in the Czech Republic, so we had some live performance! He was awesome, to say the least.

Jon got in on the guys choreography as the performed to Uncle Standa's music.

Dita is sharing her Bramboraky (potato pancakes) with me.

dancing the night away

We had such a great time!  Everyone was so sweet and the hospitality was great. We are so happy that we made it there to celebrate with our dear friends.  Congrats Standa and Dita!!