Handful Of Throttle: Prague

By Mark

Our ride from Vienna was not so terribly interesting but one we enjoyed all the same as the rain held off and we stayed dry for the trip. After leaving the city behind we made our way along the back roads which is pretty slow going and soon made for the decision of where to stay the night. After the luxury of apartments, and warm beds and showers the idea of camping was not so appealing especially with the turn in weather conditions. All the same we were going back to our cosy little living quarters, our 3 man tent!

We were first headed for the small town of Kutna Hora where there is a small church known as the the Bone Church. I first heard about this while watching the series 'Long Way Down' while dreaming away of our pending travels I always remembered their visit and with my morbid fascination with all things skulls I felt a real urge to check it out. After riding around the town we managed to find it. At first thrown off by how small it was I was happy to check it out, with only 30 minutes before closing we quickly had a look around. The design inside of the bones is amazing. There are approximately 40,000 bodies either buried in the surrounding cemetery or stacked up inside the church. The overcrowding came about in the 13th century when a local monk returned from a visit to Palestine with a pocketful of soil and sprinkled it around the church surrounds. The association with the holy land led to the overcrowding of this much sought after burial site. The excess remains led to them being stored inside the chapel. I was a little disappointed at first with the size of the church but I over came this after the reality of being in a place that 4 years earlier I really wanted to visit. After our quick visit it was time to find a place to camp.

After a cool night and a damp tent to pack up we were off for Prague, another place I have wanted to visit for many years. We rode into town with the thought of having to deal with terrible drivers but after India, all traffic is heaven. Only down side was the amount of traffic, the streets were not designed for so much traffic and my bike suffered again by boiling over after not being able to get enough air into her lungs.

With a quick visit to the information office we found out that there was not much cheap accommodation in town but we did however find something, over our measly budget but since we have saved so much on accommodation lately we decided to check into the Botel Racek. It is a floating hotel and with a secure carpark for the bikes. Just on the outskirts of the city centre but with a tram station close by we scored pretty well.

Getting into a city early is a big change for us so we made the most of it and started sightseeing, only problem was, if you want to call it a problem, that we were hungry and the weather was great, so we didn't do too much sightseeing unless you call going to different bars to sample the fine beers they have sightseeing! Boy do they have some good beers here. So we just ended up wandering around the streets that evening with big things planned for the following day. Sadly we awoke to shitty weather but that was not going to dampen our spirits and after jumping the tram and getting more free rides in and out of the city we set off to check out what Prague had on offer. We both loved walking around checking out the churches, no shortage of those in Europe and some other beautiful landmarks along with the usual tourist things. So we wound up the day in surprise surprise more bars sampling some fine beers. Sadly we had to leave the following day but Prague we will be back. Many more beers still to sample...

The Bone Church