Prague Journal

Saturday, July 16, 2005

This morning is the start of a two-day weekend trip with Honsa and Eva. We left our flat at 9am and drove to Baroun, just southwest of Prague toward Plzen. The weather is lovely today and the countryside is lush and green. Honsa wanted to pick mushrooms but Eva and Rick and I went to Krivoklat, a medieval fortress with a royal castle and prison that dates back to 1109. Premysl Otakar II, one of the kings of the first Czech dynasty, annexed Krivoklat Castle and its lands to the royal family and made the castle one of his official seats in the 13th century. The king Vaclav IV was passionately fond of the castle and hunting in the surrounding forests was especially to his liking. The castle declined after fires in 1597 and 1643, and suffered further damage during a fire in 1826. But the castle has been restored and we were able to take a short tour inside.
We then drove through the former Sudetenland to Kralovia and Marianske Tynec to the Cathedral of the Annunciation of the Virgin Mary. We made a brief stop at the St. Nikolas Church in Potvorov, and then took a lovely drive through Rabstejn. The baroque Church of the Virgin Mary at Rabstejn is a former monastery, but we could only look inside. Allegedly, Rabstejn nad Strelou is the smallest town in Central Europe. Its population is 27 inhabitants. The town records can be traced back to the year 1269. There is a gothic castle and fortifications that date back to the 14th century. The Church of Virgin Mary of the Seven Sorrows was built between 1766 and 1768. There is also an early-Baroque monastery and a Renaissance palace that was rebuilt in Baroque style in the 18th century. There is very old stone bridge with statues nearby, but not adorning the bridge. We stopped at a small, neglected Jewish cemetery and then went for a hike along the river. There are bunkers not far from the border, fortifications built in the 1930s that were intended to prevent an attack by neighboring Nazi Germany. These are big concrete “pillboxes” that are now abandoned and overgrown with weeds. The Czech fortifications were constructed according to French fortifications—the so-called Maginot Line. Similar structures were built in almost all European countries. But those designed by the Czechs, along with the French and the German, are considered among the best built. Some people believe that the bunkers are reminders of their time, proof that Czechoslovakia was indeed ready to defend itself. The Ministry of Defense intends to sell them, following an upcoming advertising campaign, to anyone who is interested and offers the best price. It’s unlikely that people will turn them into holiday cottages, however, since they are humid and difficult to maintain. Right now they are ideal homes for mushrooms.
We ended the evening at the Pension “U Zamku” (“near the Mansion”) in Novy Dvůr (New Courtyard). The “mansion” is now a ruin on the grounds next to the pension. We had dinner at the pension and then roasted marshmallows in a firepit on the old mansion grounds.

posted by JWinn @ 10:41 PM