Page 17

A walk from Stará Oleška to Srbská Kamenice

This blog post is an invitation from me for you to join me on one of my favourite walks through the CHKO Labské Pískovce, the landscape protected area in which my new home is situated.

Leaving my front door and heading to the crossroads in the centre of Stará Oleška…..

……I join a footpath that takes me around this small lake, Malá Oleška……

……and then alongside the large lake, Olešský rybnik.

Partway alongside the lake, the yellow waymarked route, heads off into the forest, following the valley of the Olešnicka, the stream that flows from the two lakes.

It passes under this overhanging rock……

…….before joining the road at the edge of the village of Janská. On the right of this photograph are some former industrial buildings which are being converted into homes by private individuals. No doubt an inexpensive way to become a homeowner 🙂

The yellow waymark arrow points left © Ricky Yates

At the T junction, the yellow waymark arrow tells me to turn left into the centre of Janská.

The path heading up from Janská © Ricky Yates

Shortly afterwards, the route leaves the road and heads uphill into the forest.

It is a steady climb for nearly two kilometres but the view at the top makes the effort more than worthwhile.

Signpost at Pod Strážištem © Ricky Yates

Reaching Pod Strážištem, at 396m, the highest point on the walk, the yellow waymarked route heads downhill. Unfortunately, you cannot properly read the sign in this photograph as it is partly obscured by leaves 😉

The yellow route descending steeply from Pod Strážištem © Ricky Yates

The decent is steep! This photograph doesn’t fully convey how steep it is. I always make sure I have my trekking pole with me before taking this route.

Srbská Kamenice with Kostel sv Václava above the village © Ricky Yates

Near the bottom of the decent, by taking a slight detour to the right, you reach a wonderful viewpoint with the village of Srbská Kamenice spread out before you. To the left is this view with Kostel sv Václava above the village on the far side of the valley.

Srbská Kamenice with Ružovský vrch beyond © Ricky Yates

Straight ahead is this view of the village with Ružovský vrch beyond. The yellow waymarked route reaches the centre of Srbská Kamenice, directly opposite the yellow building with a car parked in front of it, which you can see in the bottom left of the photograph. This houses the Tourist Information Centre which has lots of helpful literature, but only in Czech and German. Likewise, the staff only speak Czech or German.

Ve starém kráme, Srbská Kamenice © Ricky Yates

I usually reward myself at the end of my walk with a beer or two and a meal at Ve starém kráme, seen here from the path that leads up to Kostel sv Václava. Whilst there is a shorter and more direct green waymarked route back to Stará Oleška, I normally make sure I’ve finished eating and drinking in time to catch the last bus of the day, back to my front door.

Children and grandchildren

As I mentioned at the beginning of my previous post, during my recent UK visit, as well as attending the Ordination of Deacons service in Sheffield Cathedral, I was also able to spend time with both my adult children and their families. This is a brief photographic family blog post before returning once more, to writing about life in my new home in North Bohemia.

The last time I was with my son Phillip and daughter-in-law Lisa, was on their wedding day, eleven months previously. They have since then, actively taken notice of the third reason that marriage is given, according to the liturgy of the Church of England, ‘as the foundation of family life in which children may be born and nurtured’. This photograph was taken at lunchtime on Lisa’s last day at work before going on maternity leave 🙂

Likewise, I hadn’t seen my daughter Christa, son-in-law Ian and grandson Finley, since the wedding ceremony on 30^th July 2016. Whilst Finley had inevitably grown since I last saw him, what I most noticed was how vocal and talkative he had become, even if he struggled at times to know what to call me 🙂

My grandson Finley, driving his car © Ricky Yates

Finley, trying to use his mother’s mobile phone, having just eaten an ice cream 🙂 © Ricky Yates

As well as these two photographs of Finley, for the first time in many years, I managed to get a photograph of Phillip and Christa together, seen here sitting on a bench in the garden of Christa’s home in Daventry.

Finally for this post, to bring everything right up-to-date, on Wednesday 2^nd August, I became a grandfather for the second time, when my daughter-in-law Lisa, gave birth to Pearl Yasmin Yates. Below are a couple of photos of my new granddaughter whose acquaintance I look forward to making, later this year.

My new granddaughter Pearl © Phillip Yates

Ordination in Sheffield

With the newly ordained deacon, Rev’d Dagmar Wilkinson © Ricky Yates

I spent from Thursday 29^th June – Tuesday 4^th July in the UK, staying with my son Phillip and daughter-in-law Lisa, at their home in Nottingham. I was able to spend time with them both and also with my daughter Christa, son-in-law Ian and grandson Finley, at their home in Daventry.

However, on the morning of Sunday 2^nd July, I set off early to drive up the M1 to Sheffield Cathedral, in order to attend a service for the Ordination of Deacons. One of those to be ordained was my Czech friend Dagmar Wilkinson.

Dagmar comes originally from Kuncice pod Ondrejníkem in North Moravia but has been living and working in the UK for about seven years. She discovered the Church of England whilst working in a pub which was adjacent to Portsmouth Cathedral. She started worshipping there and in due course, became Head Server.

Dagmar first found me via this blog over four years ago, at the time when she was beginning to explore the possibility of a vocation to train for ordained ministry. It has been my privilege to support her through the various hurdles she has had to jump through, culminating in being recommended for training following her Bishop’s Advisory Panel (BAP), earlier in 2015.

Dagmar has spent the past two academic years, studying theology at Ripon College, Cuddesdon, just outside Oxford. She was very fortunate in being to arrange for her four-week long summer placement in July 2016, to be at Westminster Abbey. But one thing not allowed by this Royal Peculiar, was for her to preach, something that is normally part of a long summer placement – see my post about Lea Williams and his time in Prague.

Therefore at the suggestion of her Placements Tutor, Rev’d Dr Jane Baum, Dagmar asked if would be possible for her to preach at St. Clement’s, Prague, whilst in the Czech Republic visiting her family. So on Sunday 7^th August 2016, Dagmar was the preacher at our Sung Eucharist that morning. She also willing agreed to help me with a bilingual wedding the previous day, between William (English man), and Kristýna (Czech lady), held at Chateau Trebešice, near to her brother’s home in Caslav.

At the wedding of William & Kristýna © Ricky Yates

Having been released by Portsmouth Diocese, Dagmar found a training parish for her curacy lying between Sheffield and Rotherham – the Benefice of Aston-cum-Aughton with Swallownest and Ulley. Hence her Ordination as Deacon, took place in the Diocesan Cathedral in Sheffield.

The ordination service was a wonderful occasion featuring hymns and music across the Christian spectrum – from Graham Kendrick’s ‘Restore, O Lord, the honour of your name’ to ‘Veni Creator Spiritus – ‘Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire’. I very much enjoyed meeting members of Dagmar’s family who had flown over for the occasion, along with several of her UK friends. Equally enjoyable was meeting Dagmar’s training Incumbent, Rev’d Frances Eccleston and discovering amongst other things, that like me, she was born in Coventry. And it was to the day, the twenty-eighth anniversary of my own ordination as a deacon on 2nd July 1989.

Standing between Dagmar & her training Incumbent Frances, surrounded by Dagmar’s family & friends © Ricky Yates

Here we all are, following the ordination service. A great privilege to stand between two ordained ladies!

Bar-Restaurace U Soni

Three doors down the road from my new home in Stará Oleška, is Bar-Restaurace U Soni. It has been a real find and an absolute godsend since moving here. But if you go online, you will be hard-pushed to find any reference to it at all. It doesn’t have its own website. The building does not appear as a bar-restaurant on any online map.

The one reference I could find, gave the address incorrectly as Stará Oleška 76 when it it should be Stará Oleška 86. Putting the incorrect address into an online map will send you to the completely wrong location. To find the correct location, click on this link.

This blog post is therefore my small attempt to rectify the lack of information about Bar-Restaurace U Soni and give it a bit of publicity that it so richly deserves!

Let’s start with the beer. The one in the photograph on the left is the first on the list below – for my UK readers that is £0.74 for 0.5l, which is very slightly less than a pint. Even the most expensive offering is still less than £1.00 a pint!

As for the food – the photograph below was taken on either our first or second visit, a few days after arriving in the village, and shows both our meals. Total cost CZK 310 – £10.00. As you can see, each dish comes decorated with raw vegetables and fruit, a far healthier offering than in most Czech restaurants 🙂 And the portions are copious!

As my cooking facilities in the house are quite limited, until I get the kitchen refitted which will hopefully happen in July, I have become a regular at U Soni. As a reward for my patronage, I have recently twice been presented with a free dessert. Below is the second of these from two nights ago.

Do come and visit Stará Oleška. And do come and visit and support Bar-Restaurace U Soni.

Ružovský vrch

Late in the afternoon on Wednesday 31^st May, after I had been successfully connected to the internet, I went for a walk in the hills behind Huntírov, in part to find the exact location of the communication mast from which my wireless signal is obtained. But as I looked northwards, beyond Stará Oleška, I became fascinated by this towering conical mountain.

A perusal of my walking map of the area, revealed it as Ružovský vrch, (Rosenberg auf Deutsch), 619m high. My map also indicated that there was a waymarked path to the summit which then descended down the other side. An attitude that dates from my teenage years came to the fore. If there is a mountain there, it needs to be climbed 😉 So two days later, that is exactly what I did.

Ružovský vrch as seen from above Huntírov, aided by my camera’s zoom function © Ricky Yates

Ružovský vrch as seen from above Srbská Kamenice © Ricky Yates

A closer view from above Srbská Kamenice © Ricky Yates

Looking back, with the path alongside the edge of the field © Ricky Yates

On the afternoon of Friday 2^nd June, I drove about five kilometres to the village of Srbská Kamenice. Here I parked the car, and set off up the yellow waymarked route. This initially passed through grassland with patches of woodland.

The path passing through deciduous forest © Ricky Yates

But soon afterwards, it entered the almost virgin deciduous forest that covers the mountain slopes.

The route was well waymarked, but for once, the yellow arrow was not leading to Santiago de Compostela 🙂

Trilingual national park sign © Ricky Yates

Ružovský vrch forms the southernmost extremity of the Czech/Bohemian Switzerland National Park which stretches from here to the Czech – German border. It is relatively rare to see a notice in English – normally signs are only in Czech and German in this part of the world.

Cross on the summit of Ružovský vrch © Ricky Yates

I eventually reached the summit which is marked by this large wooden cross.

Limited view from the summit of Ružovský vrch © Ricky Yates

But because of the tree cover, the views are somewhat limited. There was once a viewing tower here but it was damaged by fire in the 1930s and never replaced. However, when beginning the somewhat steep decent on the far side of the mountain, I did get this view, looking towards the Czech – German border.