Jon Searles' photos with the keyword: shop

This is one of several board game shops that were operating in Prague in the early 2010's, where I would sometimes find useful teaching materials (I taught English at the time). This one was mostly of interest to an old friend who was travelling with me, so we stopped by to see if they were interested in anything. Pasaz Rokoko is actually connected directly to the complex of tunnels associated with Palac Lucerna, including Pasaz Lucerna, but for some reason is considered to be separate. What is true is that Lucerna is a much larger complex than is obvious from the street. It was actually designed by the architect Vaclav M. Havel (1897-1979), who was the father of future Czech President Vaclav Havel (1936-2011). According to Wikipedia, anyway, Palac Lucerna is still owned by the Havel family, specifically Dagmar Havlova, the younger Vaclav Havel's sister-in-law, rather than widow (they both have the same name).

I didn't end up buying this railroad-themed board game, but the name is obviously a reference both to "Mogul" meaning a rich business person, in this case a railroad tycoon, as well as to the 2-6-0 Mogul steam locomotive type under the Whyte classification system.

For many years, I went to Kontakt Foto to get scans of medium format negatives, since I lacked a scanner that could do 120 film. I subsequently had to find other labs that would do them (they are available, but you have to do some searching, and they're much slower). They were located in the CTK Pasaz, seen here, and most likely they took a hit when photojournalism went digital. CTK are actually one of the main Czech news agencies. Kontakt Foto's closure has meant that, in general, my photography has become harder, although my slowness to produce new film photographs is more down to laziness on my part than a lack of suitable labs.

This jewellery store was entirely covered in what looked like Christmas lights. This might be the usual lighting, but I doubt it because of the costs and maintenance involved. It was still less than two weeks after New Year's, so I figured they still hadn't taken down the Christmas decorations yet.

Normally, to tour the engine shed (or back shop, I'm not sure what the correct term would be in this case), you need to make an appointment, but I got around this problem by shooting this through the door. I'm assuming that #387.043 is operable, otherwise it wouldn't be here, and in any case the drivers and valve gear were wet with oil. The museum claims its been out of service since 2001, but maybe they intend to change that, or already have. #387.043 is a Class 387 Pacific with 1546kW (2074 horsepower) of power, and a top speed, officially sanctioned, of 120Km/h, making it more impressive than most of the other express power at the museum (the museum claims 110Km/h, so maybe they've downgraded it), in spite of it being pretty old. #387.043 was built by Skoda in 1937, and the 43 locomotives of the 387 Class were built between 1926 and 1937, so this would make it one of the last ones built. Strangely, the Czechs call this locomotive a "Mikado," in spite of it being a 4-6-2 rather than a 2-8-2. They cite the short chimney as the reason, but that seems odd given that the Mikado name specifically denotes a 2-8-2 under the Whyte system (although as far as I know Whyte himself didn't officially endorse the names, just the configurations).

This was taken in the EBT's main locomotive shop in Orbisonia, PA, on the same 1994 NRHS tour as my other EBT photos.