Klatovy, Czechia 🇨🇿 2023

Date: 21-22nd August 2023

Travelled: 130 kms from Prague to Klatovy  

Visited: Klatovy  

Stayed: Autocamp Klatovy, €14, N49.40240, E13.26640  

Budget: 92 days @ €91 per day

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Whilst we enjoyed our visit to Prague it was good to escape the cramped camping site and get on the road once again. We say goodbye to our New Zealand neighbours and make for the road.

With a fuel stop and a coffee it’s the best part of two hours to Klatovy. What’s at Klatovy, we have no idea. It’s not in our guide book but P4N tells us the autocamp has shade and it’s next to the pool. We’ve decided we need to chill out for a day or two. After walking around Budapest, then Prague in the heat for the last 8-9 days a pool will make a nice change.

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The campsites is a large grassed area, you can park where you like, for us that’s behind a couple of trees. The grass is mown, there are bins everywhere and they get emptied every morning. The ammenities as good as any we’ve seen and the pool is 100 metres away and pool entry is free if your camping here.

So a couple of days in Klatovy will do nicely, we unload the scooter and settle in. It’s another day in the low 30° so the pool and resting in the shade see out the first day. By the way it’s two 50m pools, one for swimming the other for leasure. The kids are all making a racket in the leasure pool, mostly older people in the swimming pool although we suspect not many older Czech’s can’t swim, the pool is deep and most just hang around the edge.

Next morning determined to drag ourselves away from the pool we scooter into the centrum for a walk.

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Pictured above, the Archdeacon Church goes back to the 13th century. It has however been modified and extended several times.

Reading the blurb we discover Klatovy was established in 1260 by Royal Decree. Its position between Munich and Prague established it as a trading centre its wealth continued as the demand for hops (for beer) increased.

Kings change and so do religions, Klatovy once a Protestant City was to convert to Catholics and the Jesuit Order was given the task.

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The Jesuits built the Church of Virgin Mary’s Immaculate Conception and of Saint Ignatius, pictured above. Considered a baroque gem but it was closed. We wander around looking at the Black Tower thinking it’s a bit hot to climb the 87m just to have a look around Klatovy, we see a sign pointing to the ‘catacombs’.

The catacombs were constructed as part of the foundations of the Jesuit church. They were used as a burial place for members of the Order and the churches benefactors until 1783. So we pay our €4.50 pp entry fee.

What an amazing experience, we spend 90 minutes moving through the various chambers. As the story is told on the audio guide, the catacombs had a somewhat sophisticated ventilation system that resulted in the dead being dried rather than rotted in the ground. The end result 200 mummified corpses.

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The names and occupation were systematically recorded, with CT scans remarkably identifying the cause of death in many cases. Many still dressed as they were interned.

The catacombs done we scooter back to the Hymer and the pool via the Tesco. What is a British Supermarket doing in Czechia, we don’t know but it’s great to find some English cheddar cheese and some Lurpak.

We scootered back into the centrum to an Asian restaurant for dinner about 7pm, it was surprisingly good. Anyway that was Klatovy.

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Michael + Pam