Cesky Raj

Yesterday we went hiking with another one of my students. She just received a company car and she wanted to go out driving. So we headed to the northern part of the Czech Republic and went to Cesky Raj (Czech Paradise). It was absolutely beautiful! Part of the forest has sandstone formations that you can hike around. They all had different names and each one had a story about its history. (Many of the signs had English translations, but it was still nice to have some native Czech speakers with us.)
We also visited a castle which was the summer house of Albrecht von Wallenstein (the same guy who wanted his palace right below Prague castle to outshine Prague castle).
After our hike we drove to another part of the area where there are the ruins of Trosky Hrad (Trosky Castle). There's not much remaining of the actual castle, but there are two lookout towers perilously perched atop the rocks. We were able to go into one of them. Even now, with the wooden stairs that they've added it was a kind of hold-your-breath-and-don't-look-down climb, I can't imagine what it would have been like when they were building the castle six hundred years ago.
There are more pictures on the picasa site.