I’m spending a lot of time in the Czech Republic this year, updating a guidebook. (I have a separate blog on that.) Mostly this is using the country’s excellent public transport, but at last today I did manage to get a bike ride. With my friendly guide Pavel, I cycled to see some famous regal horses: the Kladruby, European royalty’s go-to carriage-pullers for state occasions.
Kladruby is both the name of the breed, and of a stud village about 25km west of Pardubice. I’d been exploring this industrial, but very liveable, city for a couple of days. I admired its castle, ramparts, long pedestrian main street, historic centre, racecourse (home of Czech’s equivalent of our Grand National)… and, inevitably, bars and restaurants.
I’d seen black Kladrubys in the stables at the racecourse, but today – with Pavel – I got out on rented wheels to see some white ones too, at the stud where they all come from. My bike was a cheap and cheerful hybrid; the hosses on the other hand are premium thoroughbreds, related to Lippizaners.
Cycling in the Czech Republic is delight, as I found when I rode the country End to End last year. The network of leisure routes is very good and well signed, with much of it surfaced and often car-free. Our trip today was on a mix of quiet country lanes, unsurfaced but decent forest paths, and tarmac cycleways.
We stopped for some vital refreshment en route there and back. A café break. A cheap and cheerful plate of meatballs and rice plus the obligatory foaming beer. Another café break. A pit stop at an honesty kiosk just east of Kladruby itself. A final café break.
It was not, as you can see, a strenuous or hectic ride.
We even got some bird spotting in. We stopped at one of the many hides round the lakes that the region is strewn with, created centuries ago as fishponds. There was a helpful identification chart in the hide. I think I spotted a zrzohlávka rudozobá, but by the time I had worked out the pronunciation, it had flown away.
But the target was the stud at Kladruby, and it didn’t disappoint. Visiting is a delight even for non-horsey people like me. As well as seeing dozens of horses, there’s a lovely museum of carriages. The highlight though was seeing the herd of Kladrubys back from their day out running around, shepherded back to the stud by stablehands on bikes.
Of course, visiting the stud is possible by public transport or, even, by taxi. But I can’t think of a better way to enjoy this hidden gem of Czech culture and history than on two wheels.
That said, I can’t really think of any other way to enjoy doing anything than on two wheels.
Cheers, Pavel! Cheers, horses!