What a beautiful city Prague is! However, I don't think I've ever seen a place with so many tourists. And with that, quite a few local businesses in the central/tourist area seem to rip tourists off or cheat tourists all the time.
As I'd already been through Munich, Vienna and Budapest
earlier, I thought Prague was a bit similar to those cities in terms of such
great architecture and churches. Prague has a great cheap transport system and
most tourist attractions are within walking distance of metro or tram stops.
And, to me it seemed pretty safe. I wondered how many people actually pay to
use these public transports because most people seemed to just jump on and off
without their tickets. Probably, it's free!
I did another great free walking tour
around the city to kick off my 4 nights and our guide was a Russian American
was great with loads of information about the culture, the city and food. I'm
so glad that I did the tour at the beginning of my stay. After the tour, we
decided to change some money and we got so upset with the money changer
(professional shop) as they charged us €10 to change €50. We didn't know the
language and after signing the receipt, we found out and they refused to give
the money back. This is very sad and apparently so common in Prague. We were
disappointed but we put it behind us. I can't complain as this is probably my
fault because I wasn't careful enough.
After that, we walked up to the Prague
Castle for fabulous views of the city. After working up a hunger, we found a
small restaurant full of people and we hoped it would be a great place.
Waitresses were friendly and the food was acceptable, but we got ripped off big
time again! We had to pay €78 for a simple meal for 2 with 1 beer, 1 glass of
wine, a pork schnitzel and a Greek salad plus we have to pay 15% for VAT and a
bread basket which we didn't eat. Some Prague people must think tourists can
draw money out of the blue!!!! We had a totally bad day!!!!
Anyway, a great thing came up the next day as we found one
of the best coffee shops in town (for me) where we noticed the owners and staff
have passion about coffee, where they test their coffee, chat to their clients
about the differences between their coffee. Surprisingly, no Vietnamese coffee
in the shop, very disappointed (just kidding). We went back to this coffee shop
two more times before leaving Prague. With recommendations from one of our
clients who lived in Prague for two years, we went to a great Prague pub,
Pivoparsky Dum, for dinner where we could taste
different beers, including nettle, coffee and banana beer and an amazing meal.
We were the only tourists in the pub and it was a huge place but filled up by 8pm.
The best meal in Prague for me and I'm so glad we went there.
So, in general, I have mixed feelings about Prague. Not sure
if I'd go back.
