Tag Archives: Pilsner Urquell

Pilsen: Second Time is a Charm

Posted on by
Reply

This post is mainly an update to the previous post on the city and brewery at Pilsen.  So you may want to go there first.

Two big differences between our visit in October 2011 and October 2015:

1) We were allowed unlimited photos on the brewery tour so I made this video:

 

2)  We went in to the Great Synagogue.  Here are a couple photos:

Great Synagogue, Pilsen, Czech       Synagoge Glass. Pilsen, Czech

Also they were holding an excellent exhibition of WW II photos including the real nitty-gritty of soldiers and citizens reactions to liberation.  As history (or movie) buffs know Pilsen was taken from the Germans by the Americans under Patton while Prague had to wait for the Russians to do the honors.

One element that was the same as previously was our lunch at the brewery pub; it was good authentic Czech food at good non-touristy prices–despite being billed as the highest capacity pub in Czech Republic.

Cheers to good beer being brewed by a giant multi-national corporation   🙂

Pilsen: Brewery and City

Posted on by
2

Our major goal for this extended stay is to use Prague has a home base for side trips throughout the Czech Republic and neighbouring countries in central and eastern Europe.  The only things holding us back, of course, are the limitations of time and money.

Pilsen Brewery, Pilsen, CzechSo as soon as I had my Open Card endorsed for “Free Fare” –I will write about this separately– we planned a pilgrimage to the birth place of our favourite brew, Pilsner Urquell.  Pilsen is about one hour by public bus and just under two hours by train.  We chose the latter because trains are our favoured mode of travel.

Our pre-planning consisted of checking the train schedules –there is one every hour for most of the day– and the brewery tour schedules –in October 4 per day in English.  It made for my kind of day out; not leaving home until after 9 A.M. and being back in time for dinner –theoretically, as we usually eat out on this type of occasion.

In the photo above (click to enlarge) on the left side you can see the ultra modern building where beer is currently brewed by sophisticated computerized controls.  To its right is the old brew house that served for about a century.  To the right of that, the white building is the original brewery from 1842.

It turned out to be a rainy day which did not distract from thoroughly enjoying the expedition.  As always, Karin has done a much better job of detailing the sights than I ever could.  Here it is:

 

Trip to Pilsen and Brewery