Intro Rather than prattle on about the glories of Prague and the Czech Republic which many a travel blog will enthuse over, I thought I’d talk about a few different things for a change. Don’t get me wrong, Prague is a beautiful city with the Gothic excellence of St. Vitus’s cathedral, the castle, the Astronomical Clock, Charles Bridge and the view from Petřín Hill among many places to see before you die.
But if you where to go to a Prague for a week you’d wear out the common attractions pretty soon. So now I’ll recommend a place (and help you get there via public transport) that you may not have heard of but should surely visit if you are going to Prague for anything longer than a weekend.
It is an Ossuary, a small church on the outskirts of Kutná Hora. The church has many names, but the most common is the Church of Bones. This tiny church contains more than 40,000 human remains. With four 15 foot high piles of skulls inside and all interior decoration incorporating bones this was surely a place to visit.
The history is that an Abbot brought soil from the ‘Grave of the Lord’ in Jerusalem around 1278 and scattered it over the cemetery, thus making it part of the Holy Land, so people from all around Europe wanted to be buried here. After a few hundred years there were over 40,000 bodies here, so they were arranged into what you see now in 1870 by František Rint, a woodcarver.
I’d never heard of this place before I watched the TV series ‘Long Way Round.’ This was a show featuring the actor Ewan McGregor and his friend and fellow actor Charley Boorman, riding on motorbikes from London to New York, East. In the very early stages (before tarmac became a distant memory) they visited Prague and after that they went to the village of Sedlec about an hour away, and they visited this Ossuary. It inspired me to do the same.
Going out of Prague for the day, to find a small village with a church with thousands of skeletons inside? Should be fairly easy to find right? Right?
Planning the Journey
After a bit of internet research Lisa (my girlfriend and fellow Prague explorer) and I got train and bus information, maps and a collection of various directions from other visitors. (www.artgraphica.net/art-shop/prague-kutna-hora-bone-church.htm)
So half way though our holiday, midweek in September, we armed ourselves with a small rainforest of maps and directions and headed to the bus station at Florenc. You can get there by getting on the Red Metro and heading outside. We had been very lucky that most of Prague seemed to speak reasonable English. Luck was on our side again and we came away from the information office with a gate number and a time for the Kutná Hora bus and the content feeling that within an hour we would be on our way. We paid the fare on the bus, a shockingly cheap (59Kč or around £1.55).
Getting There
Now being a biker myself I’m never that comfortable on buses, now less so, after sitting on the boiling bus on an A- road for two hours with the windows jammed shut with a driver seemingly trying to drive as close to oncoming traffic as possible. Bearing in mind the traffic is on the other side of the road over there, so when you’re dozing away and wake up on the left side of the bus to see the wing mirror of a lorry hurtling towards you it’s not exactly relaxing!
The bus itself was a reasonably comfortable stage-coach style. It was very clean but as it filled up it badly needed some air conditioning. Don’t expect any fancy digital readouts displaying the next stop or anything like that. You are on your own.
By the end stages of the ride we realised none of the stops where signposted with the name of the town. So we got off when the bus suddenly emptied and after a bumbling Czech-English chat with the driver we decided to take the chance we were actually where we wanted to be. In general most people we encountered spoke English so I think we were just unlucky this time.
We’re on foot from here…..
Still not convinced, we headed off the station to what looked like a main street and got the maps out. Ah the maps. A map can be a great thing, an essential tool to a traveller in a foreign land, a shining light in the darkness. They can also be bastards.
We had survived in Prague by using landmarks we knew to be in the vicinity located on the map and then by finding a street sign in sight that was on the map in that section. This place did not seem to have landmarks. Not even a bus station according to the maps. After following signs for the centre for half an hour and almost being back where we started we began to despair. We hadn’t found one street that was on our map.
Well outside of Prague’s embrace now and with it anyone speaking English, we decided “This road looks ok (long and straight) let’s see where it goes.” Bearing in mind we didn’t even know if we where in the right town, so the sign with a little church on it didn’t exactly fill me with hope. Everywhere has at least one church.
After picturing an idyllic little town in my head with one road coming in and another out while planning the trip back home, I’d almost lost hope as we walked past the industrial estate and over the giant motorway fissure roundabout following another sign. On the plus side the land was relatively flat, so no uphill slogging!
Then round a corner we come across a huge building, a church, no a cathedral!
Cathedral of Assumption of the Virgin Mary
My awe was quickly replaced by the realisation that the signs had been pointing to this building rather than the ossuary, which we knew to be much smaller.
It was over, there was no way we could walk back to town and try and head out in another direction in time to get home (well, Prague). While vacantly looking at the tourist information board outside this building Lisa noticed there were two sets of admission prices, one for here and one for somewhere else.
Turning to the left and looking across the road, down a side-road, about 500 yards away, behind an old white wall, almost hidden by the trees we saw a spire atop a small tower….
We’ve Made it…
Go down that road and you’re there! It’s 20Kč (50p) for Student entry, not much more for an adult and a very small fee on top if you want to take pictures. A few souvenirs are sold here too.
Check out the Skull & Crossbones spires on top.
Pictures of the inside:
Words are no good here; just have a look at what we went all that way for.
It’s nice and cool inside by the way.
(Note: The Chandelier apparently uses every bone in the human body)
A sliced profile view of the church
The ticket for the church has some useful websites on it that you could use before you get to the church. www.sedlec.info can be read in English and has a great link to http://www.mapy.cz which has a detailed map that you can zoom in to street level.
Eating
There is a small local bar across the road from the cathedral, which serves good cheap snacks. Don’t be surprised to see everyone stop and look at you when you come in but the atmosphere is friendly. The staff don’t speak much English but will warm to you more if you meet them half way with a bit of Czech.
The Journey back to Prague.
After cheering up after the almost disaster of not making it, we decided it would be a bad idea to try and find the bus station again. So we followed signs to the train station. To get there go back onto the main road with the cathedral and go left, following the signs for a train station on the footpath on the right-hand side of the road. We had heard reports of two train stations in the area. One would go straight to Prague while the other would involve changes. Fortunately, we were at the former. We now know the name of the station is Kutná Hora hlavní nádraí.
Some useful phrases:
vlak - train
autobus - bus
Odjezdy - Departures
Příjezdy - Arrivals
nástupiště - platform
jízdenky - tickets
povinně místenkový vlak - seat reservation necessary on this train
View of station from Platform (inside)
We had the good fortune to get a member of staff that spoke good English to get a direct ticket (about £2) to Prague. There was a bit of confusion at the platform as a train pulled up (an awesome double-decker by the way, you may have seen them if you have travelled around North Italy by train), that had Prague on the destination panel but nobody was boarding it. 10 minutes later another arrived that everyone piled onto. We showed a staff member hovering around the platform our tickets and he directed us to boarding train.
Our train was not like the other one, with just one floor of seats. It was a classic style with compartments (think Harry Potter’s train to Hogwarts) rather than rows of seats, so expect a bit of cramped leg space sharing with the people opposite. You will have your ticket punched by a conductor so keep it to hand. Unlike the tube system in Prague it is much more likely you will be asked for your ticket so don’t run the risk of not getting one. I’m not sure if you would be able to buy one on the train like you can in England.
The journey itself is pretty unspectacular with little to look at. You can go into the corridor and look out of the drop-down windows (don’t stick your head out even though there are no oncoming trains on that side or you may get a high-speed slap from tree branches of leaves that stick out). You’ll pass lots of seemingly abandoned factories and lots of flat landscapes.
Once the train gets into the city you can get a closer view of the bizarre futuristic looking ikov TV tower, but not much else as you approach from the East. Pick where you would like to get off depending where you want to go next. We got off at the Wilsonovo nádraí station (the ‘Vienna’ train station was filmed here for the 2007 film with Edward Norton ‘The Illusionist’). From here you will be able to hop on the nearby Hlavaní nádraí metro.
The station at Prague
So was it worth it?
Overall it was well worth the hassle to get to the church, but it could have been much easier. But it could have been harder, I would recommend going mid-September like we did purely because they weather is still reasonably warm and it’s not that busy. While it would be very scenic in the snow, walking would be very sluggish around the quiet village.
After Googling for images of Kutná Hora I have concluded that we did not get off the bus there at all, as we saw no sign of any old buildings at all or signs for them. So I would advise that from Prague you get a train to the Kutná Hora hlavní nádraí station which is so much easier to navigate around and find the Ossuary. You simply get on the main road after leaving the station, head left and go right opposite the big church. However I’ve heard tales of people having to change up to three times on the journey there, so beware the Czech outback awaits!
Useful Links:
• http://www.travel-library.com/hotels/europe/czech_republic/kutna_hora/
• http://www.discoverczech.com/kutna-hora/hotels.php4
(Hotels in Kutná Hora.)
• http://jizdnirady.idnes.cz/ConnForm.asp?tt=c&cl=E5
(Online train booking)
• http://www.kostnice.cz/
(Official site)
Links to similar places:
• St. Vitus Cathedral, Prague, Czech Republic. The architecture of the building is incredible especially from the outside at the rear and from above. Get a good view of the roof from the higher windows of some of the other buildings nearby. http://www.prague.net/gallery/st-vitus-cathedral/
• Santa Maria della Concezione dei Cappuccini, Rome, Italy. A much larger version of the Sedlec Ossuary with a less spooky atmosphere. http://www.cappucciniviaveneto.it/cappuccini_ing.html
• St Leonards Church, Hythe, Kent, England. A little closer to home for most of us but nowhere near as impressive as any of the above. http://www.flickr.com/photos/xtinalamb/tags/stleonards/
