Episode 20

David attended his dental appointment but it was in the middle of the day so sort of split our sightseeing time into two shorter ventures into the old city. Both were interesting as we visited some churches we came across and the Municipal building that the fellow in the guide book raves about. The interior of this building is done is 'art deco' style and has lots of that lovely pink marble, large columns and wall panels, such as we’d seen used in the church in Kutna Hora. It is used in many places so L thinks that it is probably quarried in the Czech Republic but she never did find anyone who would confirm this idea.

In the evening rush hour traffic we again headed out into the countryside and forests. It is very pleasant to see so much forest in this country. Nearly all the pine forest has is plantation forest and in many areas it is being harvested and replanted. The rate of harvest seems quite heavy so whether or not it is sustainable only time will tell but no doubt it has been going on at around this rate for more than 20 years, since the collapse of the Soviet Union at least, then it could well be at a constant level. There is certainly still a vast amount of mature pine forest. There is also a good amount of "broadleaf" forest, those lovely deciduous trees that are putting on such a wonderful display of colour at present. L has a passion for these autumn colours.

We had a week to explore the countryside before David’s next appointment with the dentist. It was during this week that the gearbox, the one that had been replaced in Mongolia at great expense had really started giving trouble again. It started slipping more, though D said it had been doing so a little for some time, especially going up and down the hills, and there is plenty of hills in the Czech Republic..

Seeing some road signs for a cave we followed them and finally after almost going in circles, we arrived at the cave only to find that is was close for the season. We all enjoyed a walk up through a forest to a view point where we got a view over the surrounding countryside. On our way down we came across an interesting wooden box on wheels. This box was intreging, it could be towed behind a tractor so moved from field to field. It was fully enclosed with a human sized door at one end and along one side, less than halfway up were post box size slots, four of them, each painted a different colour and a little above them a grubby little window giving a view to the inside. Guess what it is, this trailer, it took my humans a little time spent peering in which really didn’t reveal much, then standing back and contemplating and observing before D figured out its purpose. They are bee hives: Four of them in fact, each colour slot is a separate hive inside. Now there’s a novel idea, colour coded bees: Sadly we didn’t get a photo of this as all the camera batteries were flat and my humans are totally unreliable when it comes to remembering to recharge their batteries.

As for the cave operators they obviously made enough money through the summer because quite a lot of other tourists turned up to visit during the time we were here and all went away disappointed.

A tiny little castle ruin that we came across is Kozi Castle. It was only about 1000sqm and surrounded by a deep moat. Unusual for a castle it wasn’t in a strategic position either being more on the side of hill rather than of the top. It dates prior to 1377 as that is the year ancient documents have revealed it was first mentioned.

At Tabor we meandered about this lovely old town with a large central cobbled square with narrow streets leading off from each corner, and a Gothic town hall with a 24 hour clock. On top of the hill along one side of the square is the church and an noticeboard outside invites anyone to climb to the top of the steeple so off my humans went and trudged up the 50m to the top where they found a caretaker in a small room who collected the small fee and also had an extensive coin and philatelic display and sales and many old photos of the town.

Another very pretty little town we visited was Bechyne. Here we visited the 15th century Monastery. The church is beautifully decorated with its prime exhibit being a small copy of the Pieta (the original being in St Peter’s in Rome). The castle stands on a cliff overlooking a bend in the river. It is privately owned and not open to the public.

In a small village is a museum that David in particular enjoyed, me too, for I got to sit on some old tractors. The collection inside was of mostly Czech manufactured cars, motorbikes and trucks, but also included a good selection from other east European countries with an occasional exhibit from the UK and the US. Along with all these vehicles dating from the very early 1900’s was a hodge podge of other exhibits that included household items such as electric stoves and washing machines the likes of which we have never seen in Australia. There were radios and telephones and things we never did work out their purpose. Then there were bicycles, vehicle spare parts such as wheels and tyres, and some old horse drawn carriages including a hearse, and thousands of small model cars, trucks etc. Not forgetting the tractors, mostly American, that I got to ‘drive’. The collection of odd sort of stuff reminded my humans of their friend Announcio who has a barn full of such stuff at Flaxton in Queensland. There were some dolls and kids toys too:

Cesky Krumlov is the most touristy town we visited apart from Prague. The place was just choc-a-block with bus loads of them, many Japanese and other Asians, and we all know who camera happy they can be.

This is a very pretty old town that sits on a bend in the river and is overlooked by the castle that stands on the cliff top on the opposite side of the river. The narrow cobbled streets are packed with tourist shops selling Bohemian crystal at highly inflated prices, cafes, restaurants and bars. This old town spreads steeply uphill from the river bank to the churches at the top.

We climbed the tower of the Castle and got a great view and also did a tour of the apartments that are open to the public. No photo’s allowed: apparently there is a website that L has not yet looked at that has photos of the interior. If L ever gets around to finding the website she will add it to this blog. I really enjoyed this tour as a couple of people told me I am a very good looking bear.

Talking about bears, in the moat about the castle live three or four brown bears: L suggest you ‘google’ Cesky Krumlov Castle, when she did this she found that the photos of the interior were disappointing.

Over the next couple of days we visited some more castles along the Vitava and Otava Rivers. Zvikov castle stands at the junction of these two rivers and although closed for interior visits we could meander around the grounds at our leisure. The autumn colours were about at their peak with a deep carpet of fallen leaves to walk upon. This is another privately owned castle and is occupied by a family with two small children.

Orlik castle overlooks one of these rivers too, but it has been renovated to the point that it looks and feels and looks almost brand new. Just no character left at all. This was so off-putting that we didn’t take a look inside, and my humans aren’t the only ones who felt this way, many other seemed to have the same feeling.

Then we returned to Prague to the dentist again:

© Lynette Regan 6th November 2013