Na konci cesty — Geocache of the Week
Lukova, Czech Republic is an idyllic country village with a population of 700. There you will find an old abandoned church from the 14th century that has seen better days. Local Petr Koukl knows the church well:
There’s no question the [St. George’s] church has seen a lot: it suffered several fires, it was allegedly damaged by the Husittes, it was rebuilt several times. The last straw, though, was the collapse of part of the ceiling during a funeral service in 1968 which chased the mourners out. After that the church was closed and not reopened again.
But in 2014, Koukl and art student Jakub Hadrava, who was studying sculpture at the University of West Bohemia, made headlines together with an otherworldly art installation at St. George’s church.
Over two dozen plaster figures stand in the back, sit in pews, huddle together, and silently pray. The plaster casts also contain phosphorous that glows in the darkness of night. Words often used to describe the conceptual art: eerie, chilling, haunting. The hushed “congregation” now attracts thousands of tourists who have donated funds to replace the roof and restore the church to its former glory. To get another idea what the church is like from the inside, check out this spooky video.
The cache owners had driven around the perimeter of the area many times until finally deciding to take a closer look. This inspired them to create a Mystery Cache to align with the mysterious nature of the area and introduce others to the beautiful region of Manětín. Located in the western part of Bohemia in the Czech Republic, Manětín makes you feel as if you’ve travelled 300 years back in time. Known for its exquisite beer, there’s also a Baroque chateau full of sculpture, paintings, and other works of art from the 1700s.
The location for this geocache is definitely unusual, but the cache itself? Not so much. No ghosts or ghouls rush out and scare you when opening the container. But what an absolutely beautiful, bizarre, and wondrous place to discover through geocaching!
This cache is on my watchlist for more than 3 years. This week Kidsgocaching and me took a trip to Karlovy Vary, Praha, Brno, Vienna and Munich and finally I can visit this cache and the church I’ve been waiting for so long. Petr, the guide, delayed a little bit and so we had time to walk around, take some photos and look for the cache. We found it quite soon – very nice made and suitable. After that we spent a hour in the church and took a lot of very nice photos. For leading us to this impressive location I leave a Favourite Point!
Jasi!!! (translated from German)
Together in a group today we went to the Ghost Church. We were able to solve the puzzle and find the can well. Great idea! The area itself is quite spooky. In any case, it was a beautiful trip and I will again come here. Thank you so much for this great cache and eerily beautiful place.
Hauffis (translated from German)
This cache was the real goal of our holiday trip with Elmuerte. Well, actually it was the church we wanted to visit. A really great mystical place that was worth the long journey. For showing this church we leave a fav. there. Of course, we also found the corresponding cache and immortalized in the logbook.
Have you found a “Lost Places” geocache? Would you dare enter this church?
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