Finsterau Museum of Sumava Architecture

As I think I said a while back my husband and I have had fun behaving like tourists. As any one who, like us, is doing up a house will tell you, all your spare time is taken up by home improvements, so much so that one forgets what brought you to this country in the first place. So after three years of working on the home, we decided to spend a fortnight going to all those places we kept saying we would go to and never did.

One such place is the open-air museum in Finsterau just over the German border. Here we found a wonderful collection of farms and farm buildings (including a smithy, inn, woodworking workshop) drawn from the German part of the Sumava Forest (Bohmerische Wald). These are kitted out as they would have been in the earlier part of the last century. It is a fascinating museum and gives an insight into a way of life that was devastated by the sudden fall of the Iron Curtain, which split the Sumava in two and destroyed communities.

It of course had particular interest for us, as it gave us some idea about how our house and its outbuildings would have worked. There was not a house exactly like ours, perhaps partly because ours is entirely made of granite, while the majority of the Sumava houses are of timber. Of particular interest was to see the barns in working order and not covered with the debris of neglect as ours are. It gives us an idea that under the layer of earth and compacted manure are stone-floored stalls. We were also particularly interested to look in the cellars. Perhaps we too had a stone trough which held the spring water for use upstairs at one time. Then there were the design of the doors and their furniture etc.

We had lunch in the restored inn – a bowl of goulash soup eaten at a long table that we shared with a family of Germans. Interestingly the waitress, as with the man in the ticket office, did not speak English. We had rather assumed that they would. However, I thought, I have A level German I will understand. Not a bit of it, my German teacher was from Berlin, these people were from Bavaria, the accents were as different as say Glaswegian and Zumerset. The vowel sounds were transformed, something akin to being spoken by a cow.

The Devil's Wall

As I am in the UK at the moment I have decided to write a few posts about some of my favourite walks and other sights around Cesky Krumlov.

At a place on the road from Lipno to Vyssi Brod, a little way after you pass Loucovice, you can pull into a carparking area called The Devil's Wall. This remarkable piece of geology sits at the top of an oxbow in the young River Vltava as it makes its way down from Lake Lipno. It is a large cliff of granite slabs left there during the Ice Age by a glacier and nothing is going to move it, not even modern engineering.

Having an afternoon free I decided to make a walk around the area. I parked at the car park but resisted the temptation to stand on the top of the cliffs, that could come as a climax to the walk, instead I followed a path indicated by red lines on the trees down through the forest to where Lake Lipno II (the smaller sister of the larger Lipno to the west) sat in the valley. I followed the path (now a small road) into Vyssi Brod and then took the circle route which runs back first along the northern edge of the lake and then along the northern bank of the River Vltava. The route enters a steep canyon where the giant slabs of granite lie in the riverbed and line the sides of the path.

I crossed the single-track railway line and left the cycle route to enter a nature reserve. The walk had been lovely up then but here it was stunning. Here the path runs right alongside the river which rushes and gushes its way, forcing its path through large granite boulders. This part of the river is called Certovy Proudy, the Devil's Torrents, and with some cause. The river is utterly impassable by canoe here and a sad tribute can be seen to one canoeist who presumably tried and failed. The woodland floor was covered with lily of the valley and other woodland flowers.

Having walked back along the road from Loucovice (a rather sad dull place dominated by its paper mill) towards my car, I took the short track to the top of the Devil's Wall. It was already dusk, but the views along the valley and of the trees clinging to rock were still impressive. I walked back to the car park, delighted to have another lovely walk to add to my collection.

Stopped by the Czech Police

Czech Police regularly do roadside checks, flagging down vehicles they fancy. A few weeks ago I was flagged down. This turned out to be a very good natured affair with a great deal of laughing. The first thing that happened was they realised that they had to change where they were standing, as I was of course in a British right-hand drive car. That done they asked for my papers, which I produced (you are required to have your licence, insurance and registration documents with you at all times). The licence was not a problem – it was a photo one and I was clearly driving. Then they came to the insurance and registration documents. There was a great deal of joshing and banter going on as two of the three policemen were clearly saying to their colleague - “You pulled over a British car, now you read the documents.” One held a paper upside down and laughed. It was obvious that I could have given them my shopping list and so long as it looked right they would have accepted it. Then they realised that my car registration number was on the documents as was my name, so they checked those. Then with a big grin they waved me on.

Goodbyes

On Monday I drove back to the UK from my Czech home. I can't tell you how it feels to have two places with so much hold on me, it is as if both have strings attached to my heart. I am sorry to leave Czecho always, but I always also love to come home to the UK. I have developed something of a routine when I leave, which of course includes tidying up but also a farewell walk in the woods above my house. On the walk I collected the first chanterelle mushrooms of the year and wild strawberries, on which I feasted on Saturday evening.

I also went for a short walk in the Vysenske Kopce nature reserve, where I had been watching the martagon lilies. On my previous walk these treasures had been in bud, now I was glad to see them with their dainty pink turban flowers. These lilies are so rare that they are a protected species in the Czech Republic and grow in only a few places.


The other farewell I needed to make was to Salamander's new kitten (see Krumlov expats for the kitten story). I had been the driver when the kitten dashed across the country road and into our lives and I had looked after her when Salamander had been away for a few days. She therefore very much feels like my kitten too. It was very hard to leave this spirited and delightful little cat, but leave I must.

I drove back to my house at about 9pm and was just opening the front door when I noticed what I at first took to be some embers in the garden. But as I looked I became aware that these were moving, flying around - little fairy lights floating around the orchard. I realised then that I was watching a display of fireflies. I have never seen them in the garden before, the house had kept this piece of magic till the night before my departure. I just burst into tears.

Celebrations of the Five-Petaled Rose - Sundry

As my final post on the Celebrations of the Five-Petaled Rose I wanted just to talk about the many other activities that happened. These included historical reconstructions, such as medieval jousts, a Thirty Year War reenactment group, firing cannons and muskets.


There was a show based on some of the characters that appear in the frescos in the Masquerade Hall in Cesky Krumlov Castle (one such is above).


Clowning, juggling and puppet shows for the children (and adults).


Then there was the opportunity to take part in such things as ponyriding and archery. There were falconry displays in the Castle Gardens. On Saturday there was a huge firework display over the town at midnight ( but I being exhausted had already retreated to my bed). And then of course there was all that eating and drinking that goes on all over Cesky Krumlov. The Celebrations may have suffered from a unusually bad weather this year, but they must have brought millions of euros into the local economy. Great stuff, I am looking forward to next year's already

Celebrations of the Five-Petalled Rose - Markets

In the first courtyard of Cesky Krumlov Castle throughout the Celebrations of the Five-petalled Rose you would have found a wonderful market offering the very best of local crafts. These included a wide range of pottery, jewelry, clothing, wickerwork, toys and woodwork.

I went twice to the market on Saturday and on Sunday. In the first case I went to get a present for a niece with an 18th birthday, but there was so much that I liked and was very reasonably priced that I went back the day after and bought several Christmas presents. Yes I know, I confess I am one of those annoying people who buy Christmas presents whenever I see them. Though I am not as bad as my Granny who bought her presents in the January sales! I won't describe the presents here, as I know this blog is read by people who will be receiving them.


Also on sale in the market were a variety of foodstuffs - cheese, herbs, wine, mead (medovina), jam, nougat. I bought a large bottle of medovina for half the price in the shops.

For a blog on last year's festival visit our sister blog "Krumlov Expats"

Celebrations of the Five-petalled Rose - Music

The Cesky Krumlov was full of music for the Celebrations - concerts, buskers, music in the processions. The Town Square featured prominently a stage from which amplified music (not entirely to my taste) blasted out, there were some indoor venues for classical concerts, and music as I have already mentioned in my previous post played an important part in the processions.


But my favourite music was what one might call "found" music, music which one just comes across when doing something else. This was very easy to do. In the case of the bagpiper he was tucked between stalls in the craft market in the Castle Courtyard. Then also in the Courtyard on a green in the centre there was an area where children were entertained and entertained, here I watched this recorder troupe from a local school (sorry my only picture of them is in the procession) and I must say they were very good given the age range in the group.


The last found music I want to blog about was perhaps the most fun. I was walking past the Koh-i-Noor artshop when my attention was drawn to an open window on the first floor of a building nearby. From it on a string hung a saucepan, into which a man at the window was urging the crowd in the street to put some money. When someone in the crowd paid up, music was struck up and a quartet of musicians passed one by one by the window, like the horloge on Prague Townsquare. The music was traditional Czech folktunes and the crowd cheered its approval.