We decided to try for a white Christmas this year seeing as we weren't even close in Belgium the year before, so we booked in for Prague, Czech Republic. All through the start of December there had been lots of snow falling and it was really cold, so we were ever hopeful. It was snowing when we arrived and we were excited, however that was the only snow we saw and it was a very mild 7 degrees every day after that!

We walked around the lovely Christmas markets, even more beautiful from the top of the astronomical clock tower (their tree was slightly bigger than the one at our flat) and joined in a micro-brewery tour (Thanks Nan Armstrong) where we found some cool microbreweries that all do dark or light lager and were given a map to find some of the other ones around the city which we visited on other days.

We visited Cesky Krumlov and enjoyed some carols in the town square and the traditional trdelnik which is like bread eaten warm and rolled in cinnamon and sugar - yum!

Most celebrations happen on Christmas Eve in Prague so we just joined in a walking tour that day, then on Christmas Day everything is back open again so we got to tour the Prague Castle (you haven't been to Prague if you haven't been to the castle) which is the largest in Europe. It was very packed with tour groups visiting the cathedral and great hall, but what we found most exciting was the Golden Lane which contained loads of old houses around the edge of the castle grounds all done up like they would have been years ago, as well as the torture chambers showing all the different torture devices - nasty people! We also visited the Jewish Museum which consists of a Jewish cemetery - about the size of 2 tennis courts but filled with 100,000 bodies, some buried up to 8 deep and a number of synagogues - quite a different Christmas! We found a restaurant nearby for lunch of goulash soup and veg.

For dinner we went to the lovely U Prince Hotel Terrace on the roof top (Thanks Mum and Dad Armstrong), yes it was the middle of winter but they have glass covering most of it and rugs and patio heaters - Ellen was ok in her fancy new knit dress (thanks Nan Armstrong), but soft Darin found it a bit cold. There are amazing views looking out to the top of the astronomical clock tower and the Tyn Church behind.