Premises of gardens on the Petřín Hill (Komplex zahrad vrchu Petřína)

A group of several gardens separated by walls, comprising the Kinský Garden, Lobkowicz Garden, Nebozízek, Look-Out Tower Garden, Rose Garden, Seminary Garden, and Strahov Garden The gardens on the Petřín Hill are famous for their fruit orchards, which are worth visiting especially in spring months when trees are in full bloom. The woody areas along the Petřín Hill slopes and sandstone outcrops in the upper sections of the gardens are beautiful as well. The territory diversity is supplemented with the Rose Garden and the Flower Garden in the vicinity of the top station of the funicular. Majority of the gardens are subdivided from each other by one of the great sites of Prague - the Hungry Wall. The Petřín Hill green slopes make an important and dominant altitude hallmark of Prague. In 2000 the long-time prepared reconstruction of entrance areas to the premises of gardens across the Petřín Hill began. The garden premises cover the area of 42.7 hectares (in the Lesser Town and Prague Castle). All gardens (except for the Lobkowicz Garden) are accessible to the public year-round with no limits. Funicular to the Petřín Hill The Petřín Hill Funicular was built at the occasion of the Country Anniversary Exhibition in 1891. The funicular starts from the bottom station Újezd, which is located close to the tramway stop of the same name, and then goes through Nebozízek atop the Petřín Hill. It is operated week-round from 9.00 to 23.30 o‘clock at the interval of 15 minutes, in the evenings from 22.00 o’clock in the interval of 20 minutes (in the summer season the interval is 10 minutes from 10.00 to 18.00 o‘clock). In spring and autumn however, regular revisions are carried out during which the funicular is not operated.

City Districts Prague 1 and Prague 5 May be visited freely Access by public transport and by walk: from the Kinských Square: stop "Švandovo divadlo" – tramway lines Nos. 6, 9, 12, 20, bus line No. 176 from Újezd Street : stop "Újezd" - 12, 20, 22, 23 from Šermířská Street: stop "Stadion Strahov" - bus line Nos. 143, 176, 217 from Na Hřebenkách Street: " stop U Palaty" - bus line No. 176   Premises of gardens on the Petřín Hill and its surroundings: Information: The Prague City Hall, Environmental protection department, e-mail: oopsek@cityofprague.cz, phone: ++420 236004246

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Points of interest:

16 premises of the former Carmelite Monastery, at present premises of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports
22 entry pavilion
25 the woody areas

 

Nebozízek Garden  (Zahrada Nebozízek)

The Nebozízek Park spreads on the east slope of the Petřín Hill over the area of 8 hectares. It is separated from the Seminary Garden by the funicular and from the south side then by the Hungry Wall from the Kinský Garden. In Middle Ages most of the present Nebozízek Garden area was covered with vineyards established in the rule of Emperor Charles IV, which were then gradually converted into a fruit orchard. The impulse triggering the park building was the organisation of the Country Anniversary Exhibition in 1891 and related construction of the funicular running from Újezd upon the Petřín Hill and of the look-pout tower atop the Petřín Hill.

Points of interest:  7 Hungry Wall, 10 monument of the discoverer and voyager Vojta Náprstek, 11 monument of the composer Vítězslav Novák, 12 monument of the poet Karel Hynek Mácha, 13 vase of the Country Anniversary Exhibition (1891), 14 so called dahlias’ orchard

Seminary Garden  (Seminářská zahrada) 

The Seminary Garden with area of 13 hectares is located on the east slope of the Petřín Hill. It is, through the funicular base, a neighbour to the Nebozízek Garden and then to the Schönborn Garden and Lobkowicz Garden on the North. The garden is very impressive, especially due to the views it provides of the Old Town, Lesser Town, and the Prague Castle, which are enriched by fruit trees in bloom in spring months. Originally it was a fruit garden of a monastery founded in 17^th century. It was opened to the public in 1930. Since 1980 the garden has been under gradual recovery works and regeneration of fruit tree species.

Points of interest:  15 Church of Virgin Mary Victorious, 17 monument of the writer and poet Jan Neruda, 18 fountain with sculptures of boys, spring called Petřínka, former refectory, which hosts a restaurant today, children playground, 19 chapel, 20 scenic view road

 

Strahov Garden  (Strahovská zahrada)

This one was originally the monastery garden of the Premonstratensians having area of 11 hectares and now it is attractive namely as a commemoration of once production fruit orchards. The forest sections in between the fruit orchard and the Hungry Wall are an interesting part of the garden as well.

Points of interest: 21 the Strahov Monastery, 23 view with the statue of Virgin Mary in Exile, 24 fruit orchard, 26 large and small hermitages, 27 pulpit.

 

Look-Out Tower Garden  (Petřínské sady)

This 2.5 hectares large park is located atop the Petřín Hill and surrounds the hill dominating hallmark – the look-out tower. At present this part of the Petřín Hill is under preparations for reconstruction and regeneration.

Points of interest:  1 Petřín Look-Out Tower, 2 Holy Sepulchre Chapel, 3 Mirror Labyrinth, 4 stations of Cross with chapels, 5 Calvary Chapel, 6 St. Laurent Church, 7 Hungry Wall. 
 

 

Rose Garden  (Růžová zahrada)

The Rose Garden can be found at the very summit of the Petřín Hill and is accessible by means of a ride by the funicular from Újezd. The garden area of 5.6 hectares large is enclosed by the marvellous perimeter walls of the City Baroque fortification built in 17^th and 18^th centuries and the Hungry Wall. The garden typical feature is beds of roses, which in number account for some twelve thousand. The gardening speciality of this section of the Petřín Hill is the garden of perennial flowers called the Flower Garden, in the vegetation period open to the public fro free. The Rose Garden and the Flower Garden are relatively young gardens established in the 1930s.

Points of interest: Štefánik Observatory, 7 Hungry Wall, 8 Rose Garden, 9 Flower Garden, Baroque fortification bastion, square area in among of cut hornbeam walls

 

Lobkowicz Garden (Lobkovická zahrada)

This originally Baroque garden belonging to the Lobkowicz Palace spreads over area of 6.7 hectares. A smaller part of the garden in the vicinity of the palace is not accessible to the public yet it is used for residential and representative purposes by the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany. The rest lying on the northern slope of the Petřín Hill is open to the public. Last decades have not been favourable to the garden and its current shape is merely a torso of its original form. Its reconstruction and regeneration are under preparations.

 

Kinský Garden (Kinského zahrada)

There is a detailed description in a separate article

 

 

 

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zdeHungry Wall  (Hladová zeď) (7)

The wall built of the local, Petřín Hill’s argillite was constructed in 1360 through 1362 upon the order of Emperor Charles IV. He is said to do so not only to protect Prague against enemies but also to provide living to the Prague’s people who suffered famine then. The second reason is, however, a mere fiction the construction had unambiguously the fortification purpose – the famine burst out in the time when the fortification had already been under construction. The wall used to have several bastions yet these structures have not survived till these days.
The Hungry Wall, also called serrated wall or wall of bread, underwent many reconstructions, for instance, in the time of Emperor Ferdinand II, and then under the rule of Empress Marie Therese, after the republic was declared in 1923-1925, or after the year 1975. Its huge reconstruction, commenced in the 1990s, was completed last year.
Nowadays, the wall is 1178 metres long, on average 170 cm wide, and about eight metres high.

 

Petřín Look-Out Tower (1)

The look–out tower was built in 1891 as initiative of the Club of the Czech Tourists within the Country Anniversary Exhibition in Prague as the five times smaller duplicate of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. The look–out tower is 63.5 metres high and 299 steps take you to its top, which is at the same altitude as that of the actual Eiffel Tower summit. Its first floor is at 20 metres and the second one at 56 metres above ground. The view from the gallery opens not solely whole panorama of Prague yet, if there is clear sky, then the view encompasses almost whole Bohemia. In 1998 the look-out tower was transferred into the property of the City of Prague and underwent a capital reconstruction.

 

Opening hours in 2007:
May - September: Mo - Su 10 - 22 (last entry at 21.30)
October: Mo - Su 10 - 18
November, December: Sa, Su 10 - 17
Christmas holidays. Mo - Su 10 - 17

Admission in 2007:
adults CZK 60; discounted CZK 40 (groups of 10 and more visitors, school children from 10 years of age, students up to 26 years of age, pensioners)
Family admission CZK 60 (1 adult with up to 3 children up to 10 years of age)
Extraordinary discounted admission CZK 20 (the handicapped having the ZTP ID , including the accompanying person, Children up to 10 years of age with a teacher or supervising adult – each child pays CZK 20).

 

zdeŠtefánik Observatory (Štefánikova hvězdárna)

The observatory is located in the beautiful surroundings of the Rose Garden and forms a part of the institution of the Observatory and Planetarium of the City of Prague. This observatory, as the first public observatory in the Czechoslovak Republic, was ceremonially opened on 24 June 1928. The links in between gardeners and astronomers on the Petřín Hill is also documented by the fact that this was made possible due to the Orchard Authority of the City of Prague, which in 1927 recommended a small house adjoining the Hungry Wall for the construction site of the intended observatory. Thus the Štefánik Observatory is in part made of the Hungry Wall, the bastion and the guard house from the times of Empress Marie Theresa. 
The Observatory original outlook of was more humble than it is today. Till 1930 the building had only one cupola on the contrary to the present three cupolas and the observing house. At the end of the Second World War the building suffered serious damage. In its current resemblance it was put under operation again in 1976.
In the case of overcast sky the visitors may take only a tour round the observatory telescopes and the permanent exhibition, or take part in an expert lecture, film performance, or educational show for children.

Opening hours in 2007:
April - August: Tuesdays through Fridays: 14:00 - 19:00  and 21:00 - 23:00, Saturdays and Sundays: 10:00 -12:00, 14:00 - 19:00  and 21:00 - 23:00
September: Tuesdays through Fridays: 14:00 - 18:00 and 20:00 - 22:00, Saturdays and Sundays: 10:00 - 12:00 and 14:00 - 18:00 and 20:00 - 22:00
October: Tuesdays through Fridays: 19:00 - 21:00, Saturdays and Sundays: 10:00 - 12:00 and 14:00 - 18:00 and 19:00 - 21:00
November, December: Tuesdays through Fridays: 18:00 - 20:00, Saturdays and Sundays: 10:00 - 12:00 and 14:00 - 20:00
Closed on Mondays

Admission: from CZK 20 to CZK 40

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Premises of gardens on the Petřín Hill
Realised in year 2002-2005:

• The last phase of the reconstruction of Hladová (Hungry) Wall
• The newly built children playground and the revitalised Jiřinkový Orchard
• Reconstruction of staircase
• Repair of wall in between the School Garden and SeminaryGarden
• complete reconstruction of the surroundings of the Petřín Watchtower and fountain in the Nebozízek garden is planning
• Service buildings for gardening including nearby running paved areas and roads in Kinský garden
• A vast reconstruction of the wall Šermířská
• Reconstruction of waterfall including a bridge and a new viewpoint in Kinský garden
• The phase IV of the reconstruction including a new road on the stalls in front of the Summer House Kinských and installation of new public area lights
• Utility networks and roads in the vicinity of the Summer House in Kinský garden
• Fencing above the wall Holečkova
• Construction two fountains in the vicinity of the Summer House in Kinský garden
• Construction water bodies (water stairs, waterfall, reconstruction of the park pool,…) is running at present in Kinský garden