*A walk around historic Opočno, with its Renaissance chateau and park area: 4 km*

• Opočno is a small town close to the Polish border in east Bohemia, perhaps best known today for its ubiquitous ice-cream brand, which has its origin in the 1936 establishment of a dairy in Opočno (with milk coming from cows raised in the green pastures of the nearby Orlík mountains).
• However, the town’s history dates much further back than 1936. Originally a Bronze Age settlement, Opočno was fortified in the early Middle Ages as part of the border and trade route defenses. A stone built Gothic castle was constructed in the 14th century, which was subsequently destroyed during the 15th century Hussite Wars.
• The castle was rebuilt as a Renaissance chateau in the 16th century when the estate was owned by the Trčka family. The family was heavily influenced by the Italian style and the result was a magnificent, arcaded interior courtyard (see the picture below). The Trčkas were unable to enjoy their reconstructed property for long, being caught up in fall of Imperial Generalissimo, Albrecht of Valdštejn, in 1634. Jan Rudolf, the brother-in-law of Valdštejn, was the last Trčka owner of Opočno. He was assassinated in Cheb, together with Valdštejn, and the Trčka estates confiscated by the Habsburg Emperor.
• For their loyalty to the Emperor during the Valdštejn crisis, the Opočno estates were handed over in 1635 to the aristocratic Colloredo (later Colloredo-Mansfeld) family, who held them for over three hundred years until their confiscation by the Nazi regime during WWII. This was a colorful period of ownership for Opočno, highlighted in an excellent tour of the interior of the chateau.
• Today, the chateau is state-owned, although there are still legal disputes ongoing with the Colloredo-Mansfeld family in relation to ownership of the interior furnishings. Attempts to restitute the entire property seem to have failed. The chateau is usually open for tours from April to October. The park area below the chateau is also worth strolling round.
• The town itself has some historic buildings (including the half-timbered house no.55, which dates back to the 13th century) and the walk can be extended to explore a few of the streets surrounding the chateau area. For a historically important town with a beautiful chateau, Opočno has surprisingly few recommendable cafés or restaurants (and, even more curiously, few places to taste Opočno ice cream), but the new wooden café in the chateau courtyard is definitely worth stopping at.

Note: click ‘Show on map’ above to go to a full screen version directly on the mapy.cz site. This can be used for online navigation, saved or exported as a GPX file

Directions

• Opočno can be reached by bus from Hradec Králové and there are various parking areas close to the center
• Creating a route around town and the park is best done using a good paper map, or the mapy.cz phone application, as there are few trail markers to follow
• The lower footpaths in the park are manageable with a stroller, but the higher paths would be more of a challenge