Prague first, then the rest.
Castle mornings, tank beer poured by hand, sandstone gorges an hour north and the long road south to Český Krumlov. The verdict on each, the price, and the hours it actually takes.
The bookings a first trip runs on.
A castle ticket that skips the queue, a boat out under the bridges at dusk, a brewery where the beer travels ten metres from tank to glass, and the long day south to Český Krumlov.
Medieval Dinner with Unlimited Drinks
Prague’s medieval tavern dinner with a 2.5-hour show, 3 or 5 courses, and unlimited beer, wine, and soft drinks.
From $75 per person
Read the whole verdict →
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A whole town inside one river bend.
Three hours by coach and Prague is gone: a castle on a rock, a painted tower over the Vltava, and streets that finish where the water loops back on itself. Most trips pull out around eight and hand you the afternoon loose in the old town.
Which day out of Prague is yours?
Most visitors get exactly one clear day outside the capital, and the three roads point three different ways. Choose by how much coach time you can stand; every option underneath carries its price.
Twelve hours, one town
Krumlov and back
10 hours · from $77 · 818 reviews
Out at eight, back after dark. Coach through south Bohemia to a UNESCO town wrapped inside a river bend, with the castle, the bear moat and a couple of free hours in the painted streets. The most coach time of the three, and the one that ends up in the photographs.
Compare the Krumlov days →
Half a day, an hour out
The silver town
from $84 · 673 reviews
An hour east by train or coach: St Barbara’s, a cathedral built on silver money, and the Sedlec ossuary below it, arranged from the bones of some forty thousand people. Short enough to leave the evening free back in Prague.
See the Kutná Hora tours →
Walking shoes
The sandstone day
10 to 12 hours (approx.) · from $149 · 3,050 reviews
North to the Elbe sandstones: the Pravčická Brána arch, a punted gorge boat through the Kamenice, lunch down in Hřensko. Expect real walking, and check the forecast the night before rather than the morning of.
See the Bohemian Switzerland days →
The city gets quieter and better.
Bridges lit from underneath, a beer cellar pouring since the Habsburgs, and somebody to walk you through the Old Town doorways where the ghost stories live. Prague after dark is a different city.
Ten metres from tank to glass.
Czech beer is a national argument settled in cellars: Pilsner Urquell in the town that named it, Staropramen under Smíchov, and small Prague breweries pouring unfiltered ležák that never leaves the building.
Mozart, mirrors and black light.
Prague sells its evenings by the seat: Vivaldi under the gilt of a baroque chapel, ballet at the Estates, jazz in a Novák cellar, and the black light theatre that has been cheerfully confusing visitors since the sixties.
Nine hundred years on one hill.
Prague Castle is less a castle than a walled district: a Gothic cathedral, a lane of tiny coloured houses, and a palace whose windows once made history. Below it the Old Town keeps a clock that has drawn a crowd on the hour since 1410.
Sites of remembrance
Terezín and the Jewish Quarter.
Terezín, an hour north of Prague, was a Nazi ghetto and transit camp. Around 150,000 Jewish men, women and children were held inside the garrison town; most were deported onward to Auschwitz and other camps. In Prague, Josefov keeps the Old-New Synagogue, the old cemetery, and the Pinkas Synagogue, whose walls carry the names of close to 78,000 Czech and Moravian victims. Guided visits to both are listed below, and they run as history rather than sightseeing.
Pick a corner of Prague.
Hradčany for the cathedral and the changing guard. Staroměstské náměstí for the clock on the hour. The Vltava for the cheapest good hour in the city. Vyšehrad and Petřín for the roofline.
Start from what you fancy doing.
Walking, floating, pedalling, drinking, listening. Open the tile that matches your mood; the list underneath carries prices and verdicts.
The country beyond the tram map.
Almost everything here pulls out of Prague, and the good days do not stop there: a UNESCO town on a river bend, a cathedral built on silver, sandstone arches near the German border, the spa colonnades at Karlovy Vary, the brewery that gave pilsner its name, and Moravia’s capital in the south-east.
A first Czech trip, in order.
Seventy-two hours is the capital plus one honest day outside it. Old ground first, the river and the cellars second, the road south last.
Day 1
Old Town, then castle hill
Reach the Astronomical Clock before the coaches, cross the bridge on foot while it is still empty, then climb to Hradčany for the cathedral. A long day that needs no transport at all.
Fill day one →
Day 2
The river and the cellars
An hour on the water in the morning, an afternoon in a brewery where the beer never sees a lorry, and the Old Town after dark alongside a guide who drinks there.
Fill day two →
Day 3
South to Krumlov
Out by eight, three hours of south Bohemia, a castle standing over a river bend, and back on Wenceslas Square before the kitchens close. Book it the day you land; the good seats go.
Fill day three →
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