Olomouc

From Cracow we drove on, west and south, across much of industrial Silesia, and into Moravia, eastern Czech Republic, stopping for the night at the town of Hranice and its little campground.  The woman at the reception office said they had never had American visitors before. We noticed several campers taking pix of our license plates, which are decidedly not EU.

One of the many off-the-beaten-path places popularized by Rickie Stevie is the city of Olomouc, an hour's drive east of Hranice. It is a medium-sized city, largely untouched by WWII, and, indeed, despite Rickie Stevie's attentions, not very touristy. It has a beautiful old city, two large old churches, the tallest "plague" monument in the Hapsburg Empire, and what attracted us, its very unusual astronomical clock.

Beautiful old streets

And buildings

The St. Wenceslaus Church, foundation going

to the 12th century, "updated" to Gothic in the

1880s

 

Interior, altar; this indeed is off-the-beaten-path, the first

"working" church we have encountered in Europe, where

worshippers clearly out-numbered the tourists; mass is

over, they start turning off the lights and closing the doors...

The south (bell) tower is allegedly the Czech

Republic's tallest

More beautiful buildings

Ditto; except, through some architectual blunder, this one

was built on its side

Interior of the older St. Moritz church

Its beatiful organ

And, finally, the plague monument, now

known as the Holy Trinity Monument;

Empress Maria Therese came to worship

at it sopening ceremonies (all the way from

Vienna)