Itinerary help

Cesky Krumlov is a very picturesque small town. Local flavor? 90% of people you will meet there will be Americans and Germans. The town is very beautiful but for local flavor you need to go somewhere else. Try nearby Trebon.

Krumlov is packed to the gills with Asian tourists, even last week the place was full of them. Astonishing for mid-January.

If you're going between Prague and Vienna, I recommend that you spend a day in Brno. It has a much more local feel to it than Prague, (i.e. it hasn't been destroyed by mass tourism) and it's very pleasant to potter about for the day. Check out the Spielberk fortress, the Cathedral of Peter and Paul, the Ossuary of St. James, the Moravian Karst region (absolutely spectacular) and of course Villa Tugendhat (generally needs to be booked at least three months in advance).

Brno is great, and it is halfway along the train route between Vienna and Prague. Give Krumlov a miss and get to know Brno instead.

I will second Brno, lovely little city and very easy to get round, much more laid back than Prague and folk are delighted to see you.

Nothing against Brno, on the contrary, but it's still a large city. If you really want an escape from an urban environment, Mikulov fits the bill. Less than 30 mins on an hourly train from Breclav, which is on the main Prague-Brno-Vienna line.

Thank you! This is very enlightening to me. I will definitely check out these new options.
Peggy

I like Brno but it is not really a little city. It's second largest in C.R. 400 thousand inhabitants. Mikulov would be a good idea if you want a contrasting place to the two big cities. On the way to Vienna you get off in Breclav and after a short ride on a local train you are there. If you like wine then you will be in paradise. It is the capital of wine in C.R. It is a hill town.

I just found Tabor. What do you think?
We will also be spending a week in the Wolfgang see area with bus day trips to Salzburg and Hallstatt after Vienna. I can’t decide if adding a town, such as Tábor, Mikulov or Trebon would add something unique or just be inconvenient. We like a a relaxed pace.
Thank you for your input.

Tabor is lovely this is an extract from a trip report from 2011.
Tuesday 17th May

We have a day trip to Tabor today. I had heard about this place on travel forums and found out that it was easy to get to from Prague, Andy had some DVD’s of European train travel and Tabor was featured in the Czech Republic one so we decide to go.

Return tickets cost 382kc for the two of us and we left from Hlavni at 9.16 am, the journey was fine until we reach Benesov where we have to transfer to a bus as there is some engineering work being done to the track, about 30 minutes on the bus took us to some place that shall forever remain nameless, a 2 horse town in the middle of nowhere, we re join the train and are in Tabor about 10 minutes later than scheduled.

Once in Tabor we walked to the main town it is a 15 minute or so walk but there are buses you can use, we enjoyed the walk and were delighted by the small town of Tabor, it has a warren of streets that are quite confusing, for many years this was an enclave of the Hussites in the Czech Republic and they basically rebuilt the town, I am not going to give a history lesson, you want info just google it.

The place is really nice with a town square some obvious town walls and a very nice little tower which gives great views over the town and of the surrounding countryside. There is also a medieval museum within the tower building which is very nice and informative, cost for both tower and museum was 80kc each.

We have lunch in the restaurant Modra Ruze, pork steaks with ham, potatoes and loads of veg. (150kc); it was very nice though I wasn’t so keen on the potatoes. this was washed down a Staropramen beer (22kc).

Fed and watered we headed to the town hall and to the Husite museum there, nice exhibits and some great dioramas of battles ,all a bit lost on me as I just could not really work out all the history.

We then took the tour of the underground vaults that start here, The Museum and vaults tour cost 100kc for both.

The tour was great fun, you have to wear a hard hat and even someone as short as me bumps their head, we joined a tour with about 40 school kids and their teachers, the tour was in Czech and we were the only 2 non Czechs on the tour, the guide very kindly came to us at each interesting bit and explained in basic English where we were so we could check on the English crib sheets we had been given ,very kind of her it was not in her remit to do that but she kindly gave us that info. The tour finishes in another part of the square and we return the short distance to the town hall to return our hard hats and crib sheets, it has been real fun. We then take a wander out of the old part of town and down to a waterfall area and carp farm, all very nice though the waterfall is a bit quiet, we then walked along the man made reservoir (there is history about why this was built, something to do with a fire in the old town and no water to put it out) back to the station.

It has been a great day, nice warm weather, a lovely town, a nice meal, and really nice people. This is a day trip I can recommend folk trying, not many English speaking tourists about, but a nice place with enough to keep you interested for the day and people that are genuinely pleased to see visitors.

Thank you.

One more vote for Tabor. We stayed one night in Cesky Krumlov on our way from Vienna giving us noon to 10am the following morning in Cesky Krumlov. We walked, shopped, ragged, and dined in Cesky Kromlov. The following morning we took a car to Tabor where we spent just 2.5 hours. We climbed a tower, walked, watched a wedding, and had ice cream. The walk was deserted, and a standout. We went on to Prague for the next week. I wouldn't spend a day in Tabor, but as a couple hour stop it was superb.

My vote is for Brno since I am not at all interested in CK. Brno was a province capital, is a very interesting place, historically and culturally..

Peggy, just to agree with other comments, when I was in Prague a few years ago, I took a long guided day tour to CK by bus. I enjoyed the countryside drive on the way, farmlands and some smaller cities, and big box stores with parking lots full. When we arrived in CK I asked the guide how many people actually lived in The town now. His response was that he didn’t imagine that anyone actually lived in the town, people just came in to operate the tourist shops, restaurants, hotels and the castle. So much for a slice of local life. It was a picturesque little town, but very touristy.

I have been traveling to the Czech republic for around 25 years now and have never felt the need to visit Cesky Krumlov.

Tabor is a lovely town. For good reasons touristy, but without all the hordes which flock to Cesky Krumlov or Kutna Hora. Being so close to Prague (1,5 hrs on more or less hourly direct trains) perfect for a relaxed day trip while the others go to what they are told is a »must-see«.

Such great information! Thank you. We are still deciding.

I would not take a day away from Prague, as there is so much to experience in the city. We were there for five nights and could have stayed longer. In my opinion, Cesky Krumlov was a huge disappointment and I would not waste a day there. Yes, it is a picturesque little village, but it's crawling with busloads of tourists, crammed full of souvenir shops, sub-par restaurants and nothing noteworthy to see or do. Totally not what we were looking for and I wouldn't recommend it.