The City of a Hundred Spires

Blades of grass brush my neck. My eyes flutter open. A weeping willow blankets us, branches tickled by a soft breeze. The sky above is a glassy blue canvas. It’s painted with cotton candy clouds.

The Prague Castle Gardens overlook the city. From our bed of grass, we can see the entire capital. The Vltava River traipses through a maze of terracotta roofs and bell towers. It’s spotted with rowers that look like dolls from above.

Invisible from our perch is the history etched in Prague’s underbelly. Gothic tunnels and Cold War bunkers snake beneath the cobblestone streets, forming an underground city.

We explore Prague’s basement in the evening, eventually wandering into a traveler’s bar. The pub is tucked inside of a converted medieval cellar, where Czechoslovakian students gathered in the 1980s to plot the Velvet Revolution.

We play cards and drink mugs of beer. Above us, the sun melts into the City of a Hundred Spires.