I didn’t realize when I planned for us to walk up to Prague Castle as Independence Day.  But off we went in the late morning.  We walked along the river, passing the Charles Bridge entrance and this memorial park: The House of Suicide and the House of the Mother of Suicide.  It’s a tribute to Jan Palach, a student who set himself on fire in protest of the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1969.

The next left was the path climbing up to the castle complex.  It felt like a pilgrimage with lots of people going in both directions. We stopped at the first view spot:

Looking out on Prague, you can see why it is called the city of 100 spires.

We kept on a path and finally sat on a bench for a good while.  We saw this pyramid but I don’t know what it is:

And I loved the medieval brick walls:

We went up a long wide set of stairs and there was a big crowd and lots of press.   Lucky us, it was about the be the ceremonial changing of the guard for Independence Day.  I couldn’t see much, but I could hear the pomp in the music.  Look in the lower left of this picture to see the marching guards:

Watching the photographers was entertaining:

We wandered around some of the other buildings and finally made our way down, crossing the Charles Bridge and back to home. 

Our afternoon walk was not long and was totally uneventful.  We went to the David Cerny rotating, mirrored Kafka head again. And I noticed flags flying on many buildings for the holiday:

 I had made us a dinner reservation at Alma, just a five minute walk away. We started with cocktails and I was impressed with their monogramed ice cube:

The meal as a whole was fabulous and the restaurant was so pretty. Our starter was a Hungarian pizza called Langosh and absolutely full of flavor. Ken’s duck dish (Aged duck breast, chicory, smoked shallots, pear, buckwheat, perilla, linden flower, duck jus with green juniper berries) stole the show:

I had delicious trout and we shared potatoes with caraway mayo and wild capers.

What a successful meal! We would happily return to this restaurant if we were here longer. Tomorrow (Wednesday), we depart for home.

Fat and happy again, we walked to our apartment and plopped into bed.  Another wonderful day in Praha/Prague.