Trip log #6: Europe - Olomouc, Czech

Continuing from the visit to the St. Michael's, I continued down towards the center plaza of Olomouc, where various fountains and restaurants are gathered. The town square had the following:

Jupiter's Fountain (Jupiterova Kasna), or more popularly known as Zeus.

Marion Column (Mariansky Sloup). This column was built for the protection of the town. It seemed to be very common for every city in Czech to have Marion Columns with golden Virgin Mary at the top. As people pray to the Virgin Mary, she is thought to provide unending support and protection to the town or the city.

There were other fountains around the town square as well, such as these:

From the left:
1) Neptune's Fountain (Neptunova Kasna). It was very interesting to see a mix of Christianity and the Latin Mythology around the town. The explanation was that because Olomouc was the capital of Moravia (which was one of the Catholic pilgrim sites later), and that Caesar also settled in and claimed as one of his cities. A quick history/geography fact: Prague is the capital of Bohemia, while Olomouc is the capital of Moravia.
2) Arion's Fountain (Arionova Kasna). This fountain was completed in 2002. A very modern fountain, lights and decorations were once installed. I haven't had a chance to really take a look and take a picture of it, but I was lucky to find one on Olomouc's tourism website :)

Very beautiful, huh :)

Before we continue to the more center of the town square, there were a few more fountains that I would like to show:

 

From the left: 1) Caesar's Fountain (Caesarova Kasna) and 2) Hercules' Fountain (Herkulova Kasna). The interesting thing about these fountains, and the other ones around the town square, is that only the weapons of these heroes were made in copper.

The town square also had two palace buildings, now a restaurant-house type of buildings.

 

These palace buildings were a few of the oldest buildings around Olomouc. From the left: 1) Petra's Palace (Petrasuv Palac) and 2) Edelmann's Palace (Edelmannuv Palac). These Baroque-style palaces were only open by appointment, and I was unfortunate not to be able to visit them while I was in Olomouc.

Now, towards the center of the town square.

 

This is the Town Hall (Radnice) of Olomouc. The Town Hall has a tourist information center and other town-business offices. The Town Hall also houses one of the two Astronomical clocks in Czech. One is housed on the wall of Prague Town Hall.

This Astronomical Clock (Orloj) shows time of the day, time, movement of the sun and the moon, horoscopes, and other information. Sadly, the clock had to be rebuilt after the war, and still carries a communism-style mural due to the rebuilding. Unlike the Prague Astronomical Clock, the dolls do not move.

This is the Holy Trinity Column (Sloup Nejsvetejsi Trojice), the fanciest, tallest column in Olomouc. Each Holy Ghost, Angels, Jesus, and Halos are all coated with bright gold. This column, as I learned, was built in the hopes to protect Olomouc from the plague. The column also has the Disciples sculpted around. Though it seems to have a small chamber in the middle of the column, when I looked into it I couldn't see anything.

At a restaurant called Cafe Caesar right across from the Trinity Column, I ordered my first restaurant meal. I was particularly excited because this was the first meal I have ever ordered and paid for in Czech while speaking Czech. Of course, I tried to act natural and like a native in front of them. I knew I somewhat had succeeded because they talked in Czech to me instead of English. I was able to read the Czech menu and exchange a few words in Czech- but I gotta be honest: I went to the pasta restaurant because you can't really go wrong with an Italian-style pasta that is also widely available in the US. :)

 

And the greatest thing was that this awesome meal only cost me about $6 in US dollars. In the McDonald's right across from the Cafe, a Big Mac meal was equivalent to about $9 US dollars. Mostly tourists dined at the ridiculously expensive McDonald's. I could hear English everywhere haha.

See? McDonald's is truly everywhere.

This concludes my Trip Log #6. The next log will be about a town called Piestany in Slovak Republic. See you next time!