North of Prague Episode 2

My last trip before departing for Oxford took me to the north of Central Bohemia again. Our first destination was the mountain Říp, though our first stop was the side of a road about ten kilometres away from it. The dog, who had apparently not been walked very thoroughly in the morning, began to prepare for a bowel movement inside the car, which necessitated an immediate emergency stop.

Říp is a mountain of mythological significance, as it was allegedly scaled by Forefather Czech when his tribe first arrived in Bohemia. Surveying the surroundings from its summit, he proclaimed this was their promised land filled with milk and honey. Nowadays, the milk and honey are nowhere to be seen, though various lookouts offer views of nearby villages, faraway towns, a factory of some sort, and the Central Bohemian Highlands. An almost one-thousand-year-old Romanesque rotunda dedicated to Saint George stands at the very top of the hill.

From Říp, we continued to the city of Mělník, which we had visited earlier this year under less pleasant conditions. This time round, it was warm and sunny, so we parked the car under the chateau vineyards and promenaded along the opposite bank. On a historical note, I recently learned that after the revolution, the chateau was returned to its former owners, the Lobkovic family, whose members have been returning to public life.

After a short stop at Liběchov (made solely because I did not take very good pictures of the chateau last time we visited), we proceeded to Želízy, a village noted for its massive sandstone sculptures. Last time we visited, the paths to the sights were too slippery to ascend, so we never made it to the Devil’s Heads or Klácelka. These are eccentric rock carvings made in the nineteenth century by sculptor Václav Levý. While the Devil’s Heads are quite a sight to behold, access to Klácelka is heavily restricted likely due to severe vandalisation.

We then drove south to Liblice Chateau, whose pictures at first made me think it had been converted to a privately-owned hotel. In fact, it is a conference centre that belongs to the Czech Academy of Sciences.

Our final destination was Stará Boleslav, where Boleslav (Boleslaus) famously murdered his elder brother Václav (Wenceslaus) to become Duke of Bohemia. Saint Wenceslaus’s subsequent canonisation obscures the disputed legacy of his rule, which saw Saxony exert evermore influence over the Czech lands. The town is home to the Church of Saint Wenceslaus (he was murdered at the doors of an earlier church in the same location) and the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary. The latter houses the Palladium of the Czech Lands, a richly decorated metal relief of the Madonna and Child and an important religious artefact.