Treks and Czechs

Each time I go on vacation I try to walk as much ask I can and I make it a point to go on at least one hike/trek while I'm there. There's something unique about the way you got to understand a place by exploring it on foot and adventuring along the paths that local auction times take that lets you get a unique lay of the land.

One of my favorite adventures was my trek in the Czech Republic to a castle.

While at my internship I asked my advisors for unique trails/hikes to go on and they unanimously recommended that I go to Okoř Castle – the ruins castle just outside of the city limits of Prague.

I am an independent and confident traveler, but I always like to bring a companion with me on these Adventures, particularly if they are off the beaten path. So I asked if any of my fellow interns wanted to go with me and they all hardily agreed.

I don’t know how Thoreau would feel about these kinds of hikes... Yes, there's a destination, but my intention with these explorations is to take in every single second of what is going on around me throughout the entire expedition.

Our journey started on the bus which took us to the beginning of a trail... though calling it a “trail” may be giving it too much credit, it was more of a small path following along a water run-off area. The branches were low overhead and continue to reach out in attempts to pull our hair and tap our shoulders. Luckily the less-than-ideal way began to widen and after a mile, we were led to a full-blown concrete trail.

We traveled this trail for a while, mesmerized by the canopy of greenery above us and the stream now trickling two are left.

Eventually, our paths diverge it again, leading us to the cobbled streets of a small town. It was an unusual direction for a hike to take, but the streets we followed lined the stream that we had been tracking so we trusted our map.

We wandered through towns and then reached a juncture. We could either continue straight on following the stream or we could follow the map we had been given and take a hard right into fields of grain. Again, we trusted our map and plunged into the wheat.

Sitting above the fields of wheat was a bench in the sky. Tired as we were we all needed to stop and rest for a moment, so we paused, took a seat, and listened to the wind as it rushed through the crops.

Before that moment I had never really understood the phrase “amber waves of grain”. Sure I had seen fields of grain and maybe they kinda looked like water when the wind moved them but on that day I finally comprehended the brilliant clarity of that line. Atop the tree resting on the bench, I felt as if I were a lifeguard on her stand. Looking over the waves I wouldn’t have been surprised if I has seen bobbing heads or splashing arms.

My time as a lifeguard soon came to an end because we had a journey to complete.

Through the fields we traveled, marveling at the array of crops we saw. We joined an old dirt road and finally saw a sign with an arrow and the name of our destination “Hrad Okoř”.

Our invigorated spirits spurred our steps and soon enough we saw what we had been waiting for:

Eagerly we went to the gates, paid the entrance fee, and began exploring.

Sitting atop the hill next to the castle I was struck by how long the ruins had been there. The impacts of humans resonated for so many generations. Even without maintenance, the remnants of our footprints can persist.

It makes you wonder about what relics and ruins will be left behind by our season of existence. It's easy to fall into the fallacy of thinking that our civilization’s era of humanity will continue being around forever, but nothing in the history of the world, and on that day in Prague in the Czech Republic I sat and took a moment to contemplate the futility of attempting to live forever.

—

Once we finished exploring the secrets of the castle we found our way to the bus stop for a lift back home. When the bus arrived there was a trickle of tourists on their way to see the castle, but none of us were jealous of their easy ride.