Charles Bridge

Welcome to Charles Bridge, the beginning of our walk along the Vltava. If you love rivers, you're starting in exactly the right place.

King Charles IV was obsessed with numbers. When he decided to build this bridge in 1357, he didn't simply break ground whenever the materials arrived. He waited for July 9th, at precisely 5:31 in the morning. Write out that date and time: 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 7, 5, 3, 1. A perfect palindrome. Charles believed this numerical alignment would give the bridge magical protection, and given that it has stood for over 600 years, you could argue he had a point.

The bridge replaced an older crossing destroyed by floods, and Charles wasn't taking any chances. He hired Peter Parler, the same master builder working on St. Vitus Cathedral, and construction took 45 years. For nearly 500 years after that, this was the only way across the river. Every trade caravan, every royal procession, every invading army passed right where you're standing now.

The 30 statues lining the bridge are copies; the originals are safely housed in museums. But the stones beneath your feet are original, laid down six centuries ago.

Oh, and the mortar? Legend says they mixed in raw eggs to strengthen it. Historians laughed at that for years, until chemical tests actually found egg proteins in the stone. Apparently, Charles didn't just count on lucky numbers.