Castle Adventures- Bank Holiday Weekends

Konopiste Castle outside of Prague





Dave and I have started taking day trips outside of Prague, and our new passion has become castle adventures! Last weekend we took a trip to Konopiste castle (above). We took one of the old communist era-looking trains to a small town about an hour away. On our way there we saw some Czech workers building a bridge and then i saw the most insane thing since i have been living in this crazy country; A bridge worker with a blow torch in one hand, a steel rod in another, dressed in... i KID YOU NOT a speedo and hiking boots! Only in the Czech Republic would that be considered appropriate work attire for building a bridge!



Konpiste castle was occupied by Franz Ferdinand D'Este (Austrian-Hungarian Empire) with his Czech wife and three children. We took a tour of the families apartment, which was HUGE and went all the way around the top floor of the apartment. Some of the furnishings were so ornate, not to mention the bathrooms were nicer than half of the new ones we saw in Prague while looking for an apartment! Everything is almost as they left it after they were assassinated in Sarajevo, which subsequently started the First World War. I wish we could have come to the Czech Republic for a history tour when we had to learn about the First WW in history class. I think it would have all clicked a little quicker... names, dates, titles, etc!

We were super happy about how awesome the tour was!

Me at a beer garden at Karlstejn Castle

Two weekends ago we took another trip by train (a much nicer one i might add) to Karlstejn to see where Charles the 4th lived in the Czech Republic. While we didn't go into the castle we did enjoy the walk around it and bought a really amazing piece of Czech glass/crystal. Dave managed to barter with the women selling this huge "soup bowl" looking item for about the equivalent of $50.. not bad at all! It's an amazing piece but we are still trying to figure out where to put it because it's so big!

We stayed at the castle for a couple of hours and enjoyed the weather, the hell's angel bikers, and the numerous amounts of WW2 and Nazi memorabilia (being sold in the Bazzars), which was pretty strange to be honest. It was a nice walk but i definitely enjoyed the one from this weekend much better.

Karlstejn Castle, looking up from the road. It was a really long walk!