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Kutna Hora We had seen come pics, Ewen had been there, it was now our turn...
After an easy ride of 1 hour upon the Czech railway system we found ourselves in Kutna Hora. A picturesque town west of Praha, known for it's silver mining (circa 1700's) and following briefly by zinc mining (now non existent, as per silver)..Heinekin brought the brewery here and nothing has been the same (according to our driver!)...Communist, Socialist, Capitalist - this place has taken it all and survives...just!
One thing now drives, or at least supports this town....BONES!
No BOB's here (I am wrong as the pics will show, and we were unaware of St. Barbara's/ Barbaricus (I should pay more attention!) Church - but BONES keeps it afloat!
The Kutnice Ossuary, or Church of Bones is a fascinating place, not quite what I expected. I, personally thought it to be an irreverent act...maybe, but with good intentions! As odd as this may all seem, Family Crest included, it had some taste... - I cannot comment further as I have no grounds to judge those that did what they did back then...Live and learn people! The place is like nothing I have ever
seen before (and unless you have been here, I doubt you ever can!).. Dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones, Dem bones, dem bones...the thousands of bones here,
purposefully composed was....? Art, macabre as it may seem...
There is a chandelier which dominates the centre of the church, made of bones of course, though the interesting thing is it has at least one of every bone in the human body, as Brett said it is something you need to see to digest though the pictures might give you the idea. The history is that some dirt from the holy land was brought to this site and sprinkled around the church, therefore making this a very sought after place to be buried. There was a plague in there as well which simply made the numbers of bodies enormous. A half blind monk made some attempt at creating from the bones though what you see today is as a result of a wealthy family commissioning someone to make this crazy creation.
Kutna Hora itself is just a lovely town, quiet and picturesque and man we had some good cheap food! Less than $20 for a couple of beers, sausages, meatloaf, veges, salad and fried camembert....
We finished Prague off with a 'round trip'. We ventured up the hill (it has a name) via the funicular, followed by a bit of a bush walk which found us at the entrance (we now discovered) to the Palace. Back to Charles Bridge and a few drinks.
The park at the top of the funicular was beautiful, you can camp there, snowboard and ride you horse! It is huge and of course very very green. This was meant to be a lazy day to give the feet a rest though we covered a whole new part of Prague around the back of Prague Castle. It is sad to leave this beautiful town and the food! (have you worked out I love the food?!) though there is more to see and do. What a beautiful way to wrap up Prague though, sitting right next to Charles Bridge at night with a view of the bridge and castle in the background, with an Irish coffee and nice and toasty under a blanket
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Milo
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Creepy
It's a very good thing that I don't see this many bones!