Today there will be no pictures, even though I took plenty. I wasn’t in the mood to go through them all, edit a few, and post them. Instead, I will focus on dinner and a jazz club I happened upon.
I finally sat down in a restaurant that serves traditional Czech fare and ordered goulash, roasted pork, cabbage, and bread dumplings. Oh, and a Pilsner Urquell of course. Everything was most excellent. Almost 6 hours later and I’m still not hungry. Guess that’s what you get when you eat so much dense food. I think the whole bill set me back $14USD. Not too bad. What’s always amazing to me in Europe is that the beer is always so cheap, equating to less than $2USD for a 0.5L glass. Mixed drinks are “crazy expensive” in comparison, like $6USD. Insanity!
So I walked around for a bit to work off some of my meal and eventually ended up at this jazz bar near Old Town Square. The coolest part of it is that it was housed in an old vault built back in the 12th century! Acoustics were pretty decent for the small space and people were crowded in. But why do I mention this? As a guy from Chicago who has a good friend with a jazz trio (or whatever genre they say they are these days), I realized how much I go see the Paul Abella Trio and really enjoy their sound. It’s tight, it’s fun, it’s just all around enjoyable. This quintet was good, but they didn’t compare for me. Paul, if you’re reading this, you need to look into doing a Central European tour. I will go with you for support!
OK, one last random item to note. As I walked around after dinner, I saw a bus with “Princess of the World” written across the front and sides of it. Curious, I stuck around for a few minutes to see what was going on. Sure enough, the bus was carrying princesses from countries around the world, including the UK, Czech Republic, and a bunch of other places I can’t remember. Apparently pretty people are descending upon Prague while I’m here, though I have my doubts they are traveling here because of me.
Today was an otherwise low key day. It was one of those days where I feel like I’m just living vs. vacationing. Moments pass where I think I should be doing more, but that’s not the whole point of this trip for me. It’s more than that and today began to expose that, albeit in small doses. I sense more introspection coming my way in the next few days…