7 Best Sights in Day Trips from Prague, Czech Republic

Getting to this beautiful cathedral is nearly as pleasurable as a visit to the Gothic church itself. It's about a 10-minute walk from the main Palackého náměstí along a road lined with baroque statues, from which you can gaze at the surrounding countryside and watch the massive shape of the cathedral come closer. From afar, the church resembles a grand circus tent more than a religious center. As the jewel in Kutná Hora's crown, it's a high point of Gothic style, although through the centuries there have been alterations and improvements. St. Barbara's was started in the late 1300s; it drew on the talents of the Peter Parler workshop as well as two luminaries of the late 15th century, Matyáš Rejsek and Benedikt Ried.

Upon entering, look up. The soaring ceiling is one of the church's most impressive features. It was added in 1558 and replaced and restored in the late 1800s. At the western end of the church, take the stairs up to the elevated section for closer views of the ceiling and the lavish organ, decorated with golden angels and cherubs. There are also some interesting casts of reliefs and other decorative church elements here, including a gargoyle of a cat with a fish in its paws, a sculpture of angels carrying the miners' guild coat of arms, and a small statue of an oddly fed-up-looking Jesus. Head out to the balcony for views over the garden; lean out a little and you can see the town center, including the visibly leaning tower of the Kostel sv. Jakuba (Church of St. James).

Once outside, take a stroll through the gardens and courtyard and venture down into the ancient Kaple Božího těla (Corpus Christi Chapel). This free-to-enter, 14th-century cemetery chapel, with its beautiful vaulted ceiling, is used today mainly as an exhibition and concert space.

Avoid purchasing the opera glasses on sale at the front desk (50 Kč); the cathedral's elevated sections mean that all but the most short-sighted won't need them to get a good view of the ceiling.

This is the reason many people outside the Czech Republic have heard of, and make the trip to, Kutná Hora. Forget all that beautiful baroque architecture and descend into the darkness with some bones. The skeletal remains of around 40,000 people have been lovingly arranged in the Kaple Všech svatých (All Saints Chapel), more commonly called the Bone Church. Built in the 16th century, this church forced the movement of a nearby graveyard, so monks from the nearby Sedlec Monastery decided to use the displaced cemetery bones to decorate the church with beautiful, weird, and haunting results. Look out for the chandelier, which is made with every bone in the human body, as well as the Schwarzenberg coat of arms, which includes a raven (assembled from various small bones) pecking the eye of a Turkish warrior.

Located 15 miles northeast of Kutná Hora, this national stud farm was established in the 16th century to breed and train ceremonial horses for the Habsburg court. In 2019, it was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site—the first stud farm anywhere to be listed—in recognition of its vital role in protecting and promoting the rare but ancient Kladruber breed. Covering 1,310 hectares (3,240 acres) of flat, sandy land and fenced pastures near the Elbe, the site includes fields and forests along with its horse breeding and training grounds. Visitors can take a guided tour of the stables, home to a mix of gray and black horses—in the past, the former were used for royal ceremonies and the latter for high-ranking clergy—as well as explore the coach room, the château, the forester’s lodge, and the observation tower.

A silver mine is a little more romantic than a run-of-the-mill coal mine, and this silver museum combines all manner of period mining and minting equipment with the chance to tour an actual medieval silver mine. With the first tunnels dug in the 1300s, by the 1500s Kutná Hora had some of the deepest mines in the world. The trek nowadays—through low, narrow, and claustrophobic tunnels—will probably make you glad you weren't a miner. The 90-minute guided tours (with around 30 minutes spent underground) start roughly every half hour during the summer months, with English-language tours once or twice a day; check the website for timings. In late spring and early autumn, English-language tours are only on request.

Taller people may struggle with some of the lower sections of the mines, while wider people will find some tighter sections a challenge. For those who are both, this is probably an experience to skip.

The Cathedral of the Assumption of Our Lady and Saint John the Baptist, to give it its full name, sits across the street from the ossuary at the former Sedlec Monastery. It exemplifies the work of one-of-a-kind architect Giovanni Santini (1667–1723), a master of expressive line and delicate proportion who fathered a bravura hybrid of Gothic and baroque.

Tickets must be purchased from the nearby ticket office at Zámecká 279.

If you've already been to St. Barbara's, you'll have seen the tilting tower of this church next to the old mint. It doesn't keep normal operating hours, but go ahead and try the door anyway. It was originally built in the Gothic style, but a massive baroque transformation occurred in the 17th and 18th centuries; the onion dome was added in 1737. The baroque paintings on the wall are Czech masterpieces.

Coins were first minted here in 1300, made by Italian artisans brought in from Florence—hence the mint's odd name. The Italian Court was where the Pražský groš (Prague groschen), one of the most widely circulated coins of the Middle Ages, was minted until 1726. The regular, self-guided tour (120 Kč) takes you through the Royal Mint museum, where you can see the development of the groschen and other Bohemian coins throughout the centuries, from the tiny haléř of the mid-1400s to the giant, pocket-filling Tolar of 1630. A more extensive tour (300 Kč) includes a visit to the cellar and the Royal Palace.