Sunday - Prague

Sunday morning Gabriella, Nate and I (and Libor) woke up very early...4:45...to drive 30 mintues (on snowy roads - with me driving I might add) to Usti in order to catch the 6:18 train to Prague.  Libor wasn't going with us to Prague, he just woke up to warm up the car for us, scrape the ice of the windows and refill the windshield wiper fluid (bless his soul!)

We made it on time to our train and arrived in Prague a little after 8 am.  

Nate in front of the St. Wenseslaus statue

From Wenseslaus Square we walked to Prague Castle intending to go to 9:30 Mass at the Cathedral, but when we arrived at the castle there was some sort of military event going on.  The gates into the castle were blocked off and the street was lined with barricades and many people waiting and watching.  I tried to find out if there was an alternate route to get to the Cathedral but the only people that I could get to talk to me kept telling me that everything is closed because the president is there and this military event is going on.  We decided to go with Plan B which was to go to the nearby Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary which was recommended by Fr. Kudera the night before and see if they had a 10:00 Mass there.  They did.  It was a beautiful Mass, but it was very cold in the church.  After Mass we stopped off at a coffee shop to warm up.  We made our way back over to the Cathedral so Nate could at least see it even if we wouldn't be able to attend Mass there.  Well........... Mass was over at the Cathedral, but it opened to the public at noon, so there was a huge line of tourists already there waiting to go in.  We made our way to the back of the line which wrapped all the way around and almost to the very back of the Cathedral.  We decided to wait in line for a little bit just to see how fast the line was moving.  As we are waiting we notice a man standing next to a door into the Cathedral.  A few of the servers came out the door and went next door which is probably where their vesting room is.  So we thought that man was standing there guarding the door; however, a few minutes later a woman walked over to him and they left together.  We knew there was no entrance charge for people who were legitimately there to pray and we were, so Nate decided to check it out. He disappeared through the door and a few moments later he peeked out and waved us in.  We found ourselves in a side chapel where another man was praying.  We knelt down and started praying as well.  Not long after that a stream of about 50 people stormed the door and the security guard went nuts.  He started screaming (in Czech) Help, help, no you mustn't, help me get them out of here!  Some other guards came rushing over and helped him usher everyone outside, but he never bothered us.  Nate finished praying his Divine Office and then we were able to walk around the rest of the Cathedral.

After that we started making our way back to the train station where Nate would catch his bus to the airport.  We stopped off for lunch in a small pub.  Gabriella had svickova again, her 3rd day in a row.  While we were eating another tourist stopped in.  We got to talking and it turns out she lives in Vail, Colorado and is a nurse at the hospital there.  What a small world!  After lunch we stopped by the church of the Infant of Prague.  Nate met a monk who was working there who had spent a lot of time at Holy Hill in Wisconsin...again, small world!

We made it back to the train station just in time for Nate to catch his bus.  We said a quick goodbye and he was off.  A little while later my phone rang and it was Nate.  Libor had borrowed Nate his jacket for the day since it was so cold and we had forgotten to get it back from him before he took off for the airport.  Gabriella and I caught the next bus to the airport where Nate was waiting for us with the jacket and then we hopped right on the next bus back to the train station.

Gabriella and I ate dinner, did a little shopping and then took a train back to Usti, drove back to Zamberk.  We got home around 10:30 that night.  I was so ready to hit the hay, but it was only 3:30 in the afternoon in America and Petr needed some help with real estate stuff, so I stayed up for about another hour helping him with that.