Czech Castle Spotlight: Točník

Location: 41 minutes from Prague

Czech Republic has over 1200 castles. Since our move here in January 2017, we try to visit a few of them each month.

Every time we make the drive from Prague to our little village of Biskoupky, we pass a set of castles in the distance named Točník and Žebrák (pronounced Tochneek, Jzebrack)

They are so close to us that we never go. Always bypassing them to go somewhere further away, we declare we’ll go visit them “next time”.

We finally took the 10 minute drive to go visit Točník and it was a delightful surprise.

We parked for free at the bottom of the hill and walked up the steep incline through the trees to the castle. It’s a definitely a calorie burner. My husband had our 2-year-old in the hiking carrier as we trekked up the hill.

Our fist glimpse arriving at the top of the hill

We walked around to what we thought was the entrance. There was a plaque explaining that it was built from 1398–1401.

Walkway on the side of the castle (left) The “not an entrance” entrance with Plaque (Right)

Instead or turning back, we walked along the opposite side of the castle through the trees.

“Not really a path” path. (far right) A window into old stables (middle) The old stables (right)

Our “not really a path” path led us to a bear enclosure with 2 sibling bears inside. The bears have been here since 2013 and were found as orphans.

After we walked around the bears, we came up to the front entrance of the castle

Bridge to the front entrance

My son was enamored with the pot bellied pig roaming near the front of the bridge.

The resident pot bellied pig

We finally entered the castle and paid our entrance fee of 90 Kč, ($3.91)

Every time we visit a castle my mind conjures up old images from movies and fairy tales. I’m always surprised, like “wow, they really did look like this”

There was a chapel with some furniture and paintings.

And the bedroom of the king

View from the kings bedroom. (left) Room that we think was the bathroom (right)

There are so many building and rooms to explore.

Looking down onto the village of Žebrák

Final set of buildings on our way out

The castles we visit range from grand chateaus on acres of land to stone frame ruins and piles of rock. I expected the latter, yet Točník was so much more. Of course having a toddler in tow makes you slow down and pay closer attention to details, so that helped.

You could easily run through this place in 30 minutes. We spent about 2.5 hours here with the hike up, pot bellied pig staring, and toddler chasing.

Get more details on their website here: http://www.tocnik.com/

We have 4 months left in this country before we move on to Thailand.

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