Prague day 1

I arrived in Prague pretty far away from Tessa's hotel, where I was set to meet her in about two hours.  I had my GPS with me and a fix on the hotel, so I began walking - not exactly knowing the local train system and not thinking it was too Far.  My GPS gave me driving directions, though, not walking directions, and I ended up spending the whole two hours walking to the hotel, so I didn't have time to find my own place.

I got to the hotel lobby and emailed Tessa, who responded that she had joke waken up from a nap and would be right down.  I haven't seen Tessa since her wedding in Atlanta some time ago so it was really cool to hang out again.  She was nice enough to join me in my search for a hotel.  I was lucky to find a great hotel with a private room for only 50 euros - it was the nicest hotel I have stayed at so far.

I was planning on staying in hostels just so I could meet people, but I was going to be hanging out with Tess here anyway - and its nice to have a private room sometimes anyway.

We grabbed some lunch and then Tessa had to go work for a few hours - ey were shooting a commercial for the Marines and were going to go get camera shots from a remote controlled helicopter of Prague with the US embassy and flag in the foreground.  Tessa said they would be filming in the park behind the embassy and I could meet them in a bit. 

After we parted ways I visited the Charles bridge.  There were tons of people there and lots of little stands along the bridge with jewelry and paintings by the locals.  On the other side of the bridge there was a torture device museum which I visited and immediately regretted.  I wanted to leave almost immediately but I had spent the six euro so I made myself stay.  There were 40 torture devices on display, complete with ancient painted depictions of each.  It was also incredibly hot it there - I guess they wanted you to suffer a bit, too.  Make that 41 torture devices.

After the museum it was time for the commercial to be filmed so I headed to the park.  I hiked up the path behind the embassy and found a bench to sit on and waited for an hour or so.  I could see the crew on the terrace of the embassy but learned later they decided to film from inside the embassy.  I didn't see the helicopter but the view from where I was was absolutely amazing.  I was afraid I might get brought in for questioning, though, as I was almost in the bushes snapping photos of Tessa on the embassy terrace. I probably looked like a terrorist.

After waiting a while and enjoying the view I decided to head back to the hotel for a nap and so I could email Tessa and figure out what the deal was.  We agreed to meet up a bit later for dinner.  After meeting up we wandered aimlessly until we found a place that was open (it was already about 10) and enjoyed some local Czech cuisine - meat and potatoes. 

After dinner we walked around looking for any place that looked like it had some night life going on, but all we could find were closed shops and bars with one or two people in them.  We finally found a little hidden bar full of locals downstairs from what I think was a hostel.  We hung out there for a bit, unable to speak to anyone, and then went back to our respective hotels (Tessa's was almost next door to the embassy and looked very expensive).