The Wonders of Karlovy Vary (Karlsbad)

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Walking the streets of Karlovy Vary it is easy to see that this is a town where, for centuries, people with money, and I mean MONEY, have vacationed. I have never seen a town with so many fancy, five star hotels sitting so close together. Most, not all, but most of these hotels were built during the Victorian era and thus the architecture is ornate and very beautiful. Why do they come to this small city? People come here to drink and bath in the hot mineral waters.

I have read that Charles IV found the hot springs when a stag he had shot fell into one of the pools of hot water. A description of the medicinal properties of the mineral waters has been found in a book published in 1522. By the end of that century it is reported there were over two hundred spa buildings. There are twelve springs in use today. The most famous is named Vrildo, which shoots water that is 161f degrees 40 feet into the air. Nancy--(Well we think there is such a spring but we didn't find it ). However we did stick our fingers into various little spigots from which different mineral waters flow and they were definitely HOT. I think they varied from 50C to 62C and for those who don't do C temps in their heads remember that 40 is equal to 104. They were too hot to keep our fingers in. I tasted two of them and all they tasted like was rusty pipe. I suppose they were iron waters and I definitely didn't want to drink any of that foul tasting water. I suppose the 'medicinal' properties of the water had something to do with the nasty taste since people often equate good medicine with bad tastes.

So, if we don't like mineral water and we don't like hot water for drinking or bathing why did we go to Karlovy Vary? Our friends Mori and Lillian went there when they were here volunteering and were enchanted with the city. We went to see what the charm was. The charm is varied. There are lovely green forests with hundreds of kilometers of trails on them and a nice funicular to ride to the top of the hill overlooking the city. There is a tall tower at the top of the hill and a lift inside to take you free of charge to the top of the tower. The view from the tower is spectacular!! At the base of the tower is a good restaurant called Diana. Our first afternoon we ate a great crepe with blueberry sauce and lots of good blueberries plus whipped cream. Our second afternoon we ate a good hearty soup in a bread bowl and a BIG green salad with cheese and ham on it. These were delicious foods at a reasonable cost. We walked all over the hills beginning at the middle of the funicular the first day and at the top of the hill the second day. We could have walked for days if we had the time but restricted my natural inclination to say "Let's go over that hill, just one more, just one more." since we only had a day and a half there. I would enjoy going back with more time and heading out to some of the other towns that you can walk to just for fun.

It was fun to look in the windows of the shops and see all the beautiful and EXPENSIVE things for sale. Prague doesn't have any shops that I am aware of that sell items of equal loveliness and expense. I would never have any place that I go to wear such designer clothes as many stores had for sale but they were wonderful to look at. A lot of the shops had such names as Versace and various designers from Paris, Rome, etc. As Bill has told you, many of the women we saw on the street, in restaurants, going into the casino, etc. were dressed up in that sort of style. When I say they had on GOOD dresses and suits and had shoes to MATCH I don't mean they had dyed some simple little pump to match their outfit. I mean someone had designed shoes of shapes and colors to exactly compliment the outfit. It was fun to see but way out of any league I could play in.

The river that runs through town runs right through the center of everything. Their are hotels, shops and restaurants on each side of the pretty river and plenty of small pedestrian bridges crossing it. We ate supper in a very nice outdoor cafe that was on a bridge. The sun stays up until very very late this time of year (and is up enough by 4:10 for it to be totally light outside as I discovered this a.m. when I woke up at that time.) So, the evening was long and lovely and we got to walk and see all the flowers and parks and birds flying around the water and feeding baby birds, etc. What a nice town!

Russians love Karlovy Vary. In fact, many of the businesses are Russian owned and many of the tourists are Russian. We have never been in a town, or any other place for that matter, where at last half of the advertising is in Russian. We discovered an out of this world Russian Orthodox Church about which we will write a separate entry.

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Photos

Our Hotel In Karlovy Vary
Our room was on the very top floor, the middle windown and window on the right.

One of the Many Fancy Hotels
No, we did not stay yere.

City Park
One of the many hotels is in the distance.

Comments

[Candace]

Hotel in Karlovey Vary
Could you please post the name of the hotel you stayed in? Thanks