Celebration 1 - The 5 Petaled Rose

I devoted several posts last year to Cesky Krumlov's annual jolly The Celebrations of the Five-Petaled Rose, but this year it will have to do with one. For three days the town is full of people wandering round in historical dress (you do get in free if you are in costume) and everywhere you turn, there is entertainment. Last year I was wowed by it, this year, I think because of a combination of less fortunate weather and the beginning of a migraine, less so. People's jollity all seemed a little bit forced, not surprising in the rain. Nevertheless my husband, who was seeing for the first time, enjoyed it.

One of the fun things about the event was watching for anachronisms - renaissance children with modern knapsacks as above. Men in doublet and hose answering their mobile phones - you get the idea.


My favourite site for entertainment is always the castle courtyard - this is where you get small local community groups performing as well as more professional entertainers. It was here that I caught the local gypsy dance group. A fat little man, whom I have seen regularly strutting around the streets of the town, fiddled with a large tape deck and a group of girls of all ages, dressed in their traditional costumes, danced on the grass in front of an appreciative audience.

Around the courtyard was set the market selling crafts and some food. The festival provides three red-letter days in the calendar of local craftspeople, a time when they get to sell to an audience of many thousands. But this year the rain took its toll, last year by the third day the stalls were beginning to look bare, but this year they were almost as full as on the first. My husband did his bit, by buying me a little basket in which to collect wild strawberries from the woods (I have used it already). But I fear that at this time of recession the town's weather conspired against a good harvest for the craftspeople of Krumlov.