 Activities |
The Czech Republic's rolling hills and low mountains are perfect for hearty hiking, especially in the Sumava of western and southern Bohemia and the Krkonose mountains in northern Bohemia. Climbers should head to the Sandstone Rocks of the Labe in northern Bohemia and cavers should check out the Moravian Karst area north of Brno. The prime boating river is the scenic but unfortunately polluted Sazava.
Downhill skiing is plentiful, popular and relatively cheap in the Czech Republic, though facilities are not up to Western European standards and queues are long. Hired gear is generally of poor quality, so it's best to bring your own equipment. The country's best downhill skiing can be found at Spindleruv mlyn in the Krkonose between January and early April; Sumava has the best cross-country skiing trails.
| Getting There & Away |
Scheduled international flights arrive only at the capital, Prague, which is connected worldwide by at least two dozen international carriers, including CSA (Ceske aerolinie), the old state-run airline. Buying tickets in the republic won't save you much money, so if you're only going to the one destination, take advantage of the lower cost of a return (round-trip) ticket bought at home. Alternatively, consider arriving by train, as it's the easiest (if not the cheapest) way to get from Western Europe to the Czech Republic. There are some 18 rail crossings into the republic. By road, visitors can enter the republic at over 30 points, and the list is growing all the time.
Click to enlarge (446ko)
| Getting Around |
Internal flights are available within the Czech
Republic, with regular connections between Prague-Ostrava
and Prague-Brno. Czech Railways provides clean,
efficient train service to almost every part of
the country, though express buses are often faster
and more convenient than the train. Buses are more
expensive, but, by European standards, both are
cheap. Car, motorbike and bicycle are ideal ways
to see the republic, and, in Prague, feet, trams
and the metro are the best ways to get around. |
| Recommended Reading |
The Europe-based journalist Timothy Garton Ash's We the People: the Revolutions of 1989 features gripping I-was-there accounts of the revolutions that swept away the region's old guard in 1989.
William Shawcross' Dubcek & Czechoslovakia is a biography of the late leader of Prague's original Spring, with a hasty post-1989 update. Another biography is Michael Simmons' The Reluctant President: A Political Life of Vaclav Havel.
Several books by the dissident-turned-president, Vaclav Havel, offer an 'inside' view. Disturbing the Peace is a collection of recent historical musings. Letters to Olga is a collection of letters to his wife from prison in the 1980s. Living in Truth is a series of absorbing political essays.
Milan Kundera is one of the Czech Republic's best-known authors-in-exile, who wrote about life under the Communist regime. His best novel is probably Joke; two other notable works are The Unbearable Lightness of Being and The Book of Laughter and Forgetting. Other good reads are Cowards by Josef Skvorecký, The Ship Named Hope by Ivo Klima and anything by Bohumil Hrabal.
Jaroslav Hasek's The Good Soldier Svejk is good low-brow WW I humour about the trials of the republic's literary mascot, written in instalments from Prague's pubs.
Bruce Chatwin's Utz is a quiet, absorbing novella about a porcelain collector in Prague's old Jewish quarter.
| Lonely Planet Guides |
Czech & Slovak Republics - a travel survival kit
Europe on a shoestring
Eastern Europe on a shoestring
Central Europe on a shoestring
Prague city guide
Eastern Europe phrasebook
Central Europe phrasebook
| Travellers' Reports |
Click here for the latest (but unverified) travellers' reports on the Czech Republic
| On-line Info |
Take the subWWWay to Czech Republic
Your browser may not support Czech accents, but trust us: our Czech is diskotéka. |
