it was just like mission impossible

PRAGUE
i was looking forward to the visual-ness of prague. everytime i told someone i was going there before coming, there was a big gasp in response to prague. the czech republic had a bad first impression on us at the beginning--we had to sit in our hot double-decker coach for 2+ hours at the border while they checked all our passports & some kind of paperwork for the bus. i got to sit in the front of the top level which was cool for the view, but for some reason the heat was on for much of our sleepy-travel & i think the vents for the entire coach were right in front of me.

but the landscape was amazing. there was certainly still a busy city-feel, but the architecture was quite different from most in berlin. the red-orange roofing was signature from the view of a castle tower, but as you roamed through the cobblestone streets, each old building had its own cool paint. we went to museums here as well, but not as many. most of my free time was spent on or around the charles bridge. it's a very old, famous, picturesque bridge for pedestrians with endless vendors along the whole thing. i liked it best our first night--we went in the later evening and it was kind of raining so there weren't very many people, but we got to just enjoy the view & the presence... this was the bridge that was on mission impossible--the guy falls off after he pretends to be shot. so we had fun with some mission impossible pictures. one of the best parts was the mini hike we took up a green hill that gave us a beautiful view of the city & a quiet place to just sit/lay after a good dinner. i want to go back to prague to just be there.

i enjoyed much more of the food in prague (or 'praha' as they call it), but i didn't really give berlin a chance other than the bratwurst--which is better when my mom makes it. i went crazy with the gelato. i'm not even the biggest ice cream fan, but i devoured 9 big scoopes of gelato during my 3 days of praha. the blood orange flavor was hands-down my favorite, but i loved the super-tart lemon flavor & the combination of banana and chocolate. the chocolate was like brownie-batter--such creamy goodness! i ate dinner twice in the same spot because i liked it so much: big pizzas and my first try of gnocchi, which i loved. i ate lunch at the same place twice because i liked it so much. it was a crazy pub with a restaurant setting downstairs and interesting cartoons painted everywhere, (when i say interesting, i mean they would have been inappropriate had we been able to read czech.) but there were cheap soups--(french onion was my favorite), and lots of dishes with bohemian dumplings. i got the fruit dumplings which had apricots baked inside & cocoa, sugar & sour cream on the side. i loved them.

BOMBS AGAIN
as we were walking through prague, one girl in our group peeked in the windows of a hotel & briefly saw a television program flashing london scenes & the words 'london alert'. we stopped at an internet cafe that evening & learned that there had been 3 more tube bombs & 1 bus bomb. again! it was even more humbling this time! we were there with kaleb, joe's 15-year-old son, who said "how weird that both times london has been bombed and both times, our whole group has been out of london." we gave him a good tease and a smile saying, "or it could be Heavenly Father--maybe some people think it's weird..." i heard the news when we got back that all terrorists still involved were found & caught.