Prague - Day 3

Tauck was taking us on a tour of the castle district this morning.  We were each provided a Vox system.  Our local guide speaks softly into her microphone and we all can hear her.  You can even go hundreds a feet away and still listen.  This is great when you get tired of standing in front of the same object and you want to go sit on that bench across the way.

We all met downstairs about 8:30AM after breakfast and boarded our mini-vans.  Unlike most of the other river cruises, Tauck only has 130 guests and provides 3 Tauck directors and one cruise director to assist us with our needs.  We are very well taken care of. 

Our first stop was at St. Vitus Cathedral.  To enter the Prague Castle District, you must pass the President's office and the changing of the guard.

You can see from the photos below that the Cathedral is awe-inspiring. Work began in 1344 and finally completed in 1929.  There is gothic vaulting, flying buttresses, stained glass windows, gargoyles and beautiful gardens.

We then walked back to our mini-vans after a bathroom break.  Tauck provided us coins to pay the little lady that runs the toilets.  Such an unexpected nice touch.

After a very brief ride further up the hill, we exited our mini-vans to see the Strahov Monastery founded in 1140 and its incredible library.  As a Tauck exclusive, we got to actually go into the library itself instead of seeing it from the doorway.  Incredible feeling being amongst all those philosophical books.

View from the Monastery

After dropping us back at our hotel for lunch on our own, at 2:15PM, we were off on a walking tour of the Jewish Quarter.  Two other walking tours were offered, one focusing on Communism and one an abbreviated tour of Old Town.  Tauck offers all tours complimentary unlike most other river cruises.

We made a stop at the astronomical clock in Old Town to see the clock strike three and the apostles go around.  We walked by the apartment where Kafka lived and then it was on to the Maisel Synagogue.  Jeff and I had already seen it yesterday but our guide added so much more insight about being Jewish in Prague.  Her mother and father-in-law were survivors of Auschwitz.

We then saw the Pinkas Synagogue with its tribute to the 80,000 names of Czech Jews who perished in WWII and the camps where the atrocities occurred.  Finally, we strolled through the Old Jewish Cemetery with its headstones from the 1400's.

Some of the 80,000 names of the slaughtered Czech Jews

One of the old synagogues

We're now packing up for our morning trip to our river cruise ship, the MS Savor.  Tauck will pick up our bags in our room at 7:00AM and we board buses at 8:30AM for the four hour trip to Regensburg, Germany and the Danube River.  All bellman, breakfast waiters, drivers and cruise director tips are taken care of by Tauck which relieves us from the worry of having enough foreign currency.

Goodnight.