Let's Go - Ruckl Crystal and Koněprusy Caves

Yesterday, the SCA (think PTA in the U.S.) went on it's last field trip of the year.  For this final foray, we loaded our cars with friends and headed to the Ruckl Crystal factory and the Koněpruské jeskyně (caves).  
First, the crystal factory.

Located about 35 km (20 miles) from school, Ruckl produces some of the finest lead crystal in the world.  We are talking Wimbledon trophy, Stanley Cup quality here. But that isn't surprising, because the Czech Republic is renown for its crystal. 

Founded over 300 years ago by the Rückl family, the crystal made here is completed entirely by hand.  Let me repeat that, it is done COMPLETELY by hand.  It is impressive, in the fact that much of it could be automated.  It could be mass produced and mass marketed, but it is not.  It is still heated, blown, quality checked and etched by real, live human beings that have spent years (3 in trade school, 7 or more as an apprentice) learning their craft.  The molds are still made of wood (pear or oak) and the cutting wheels are manned by very skilled artists.

Some of the worn out wooden molds.  They can only use each mold 40 times before they loose their shape, and a new one needs to be created.

We started our tour by visiting the furnace and glass blowing area.  This is where the chemicals are mixed, added to the furnace and shaped into balls of goo.  Really, they are balls of steaming hot goo.  They are then rounded into perfect spheres and placed into their specific mold.  Here they are blown into shape by giant straws (I kid you not), removed from said straw, and placed in a special cooler to, well, cool.  It takes hours, sometimes a full day, for the glass to cool.  Being heated to over 1000 degrees Celcius will do that to you.

Being formed into a perfect sphere.

It is then placed in the mold, where a very interested helper (I kid...) helps to press it down into the mold so that it keeps its shape.  

Once removed from the "straw", the object is placed in a pile of sand awaiting transport to the cooling area.

This is the man who will transport it to the cooling area.  Over, and over and over again.  This man walks miles a day and only covers the same 5 feet of floor.

 

A different form being shaped.

And a slightly different process on how it gets to cooling.  This is the guy from the picture above.  He has just blown this piece and it is ready for cooling, but first it needs some final touches...

So it is handed off, from one hot poker to another...

He literally takes a small axe to the jagged edges at the top, essentially removing that top bulb...

Trims the rough parts with a scissors...

And files it down...

This is the pile of oops.  It will get reheated, and reworked.

We then headed into the quality control room.  Every single piece must go through here before being sent to the etching room.  About 20% of the pieces are rejected because they have bubbles, a weak spot or are just not exactly right in one way or another.  They too will be recycled and reworked.

Finally, it is off to etching for those pieces that make it that far.  First, they do a net drawing on the piece.  It isn't etched, it is just marked into equal parts so that the etching can be completed symmetrically.  These marked pieces are then passed on to the masters for completion.  It was incredible to watch.  All of them lined up in a row.  Each with their own set of crystal awaiting their mark.  And each of them never faltering, not once making a misstep, nor stopping their wheels. 

And these goofballs my friends ate it all up.

A quick lunch and we were off to take a tour of the Koněprusy Caves.  The oldest (over 400 million years) and largest (more than a mile and a half on three levels) cave system in the Czech Republic, it was discovered in 1950 by miners blasting on the hill.  Opened to the public in 1959, the tour takes visitors deep into history.

The caves were formed by a small stream that flowed through the area about 2 1/2 million years ago, aided by the rainfall that seeped in through cracks in the limestone.  This drip-stone created thousands of stalactites and stalagmites, and the Koněprusy Roses, which can only be found inside this cave!  The roses are formed by calcium carbonate mixed in with the rainwater, which then became precipitation on the walls of the cave.  This created small bushes which, when the very tips dropped off, left a rose shaped formation.  Spectacular.

But the cave isn't all limestone.  In the earth filled areas, scientists found the remains of hundreds of animals - many of them prehistoric and dated around the Pleistocene period (3-2,000,000 years ago).  Bones from the Mastodon, Sabre tooth tiger, Woolly Rhino and more are on display, as are the remains from a Neanderthal man from more than 13,000 years ago.  

And there was also a counterfeiting ring run from inside the caves.  From 1460-1470 a group of unknown me made Hussite coins, using copper with a thin cover of silver amalgam, instead of pure silver.

The old mine.

The Waterfall - looks like it is frozen in time.

That small piece on the tip took over 65 years to grow.

Bats still use the caves as their home in the cooler months.  This guy was about the size of one of my fingers.

Koněprusy Roses - looks like Broccoli to me.

The largest Stalagmite.  It was probably a good 15 feet tall.

The left - a stalagmite with a face.  The right - a forearm and fist.  Can you see them?

The bones.  Woolly Rhino is number 3.

The area the forgers used.

Home Sweet Home

Last January, we arrived in Prague for the first time.  Not to see the sights (which we did) but to find a house.  We were moving all of our worldly goods in less than 6 weeks and we still had no place to put them when the container landed.  We had already done this dance, twice, in Chile and kind of knew what to expect.  And because of this our list of Must Have's, was a pretty short list - it needed to be habitable, the rooms had to fit our American sized furniture (read - Large) and it had to have a backyard for our American sized dog. And none of them were negotiable.  Because, it's not that I want a big house (it is just more for me to clean), we needed one.  And according to most European standards, we needed a mini-mansion to accommodate our things.  When we moved from California to start our expat life in Chile, we had the option to store some of the things that we didn't need, wouldn't use or just didn't want to take with us.  We did not have that option when moving to Prague.  Everything we had was going to move with us and it had to fit.  Much easier said than done.

In three days of house hunting, we found less than a handful that would actually be viable. Over 30 houses and we had a front runner and a back up.  That's it.

And then our relocation agent got a call about a house that was not yet on the market, but would be perfect for us.  She would let us come and see it, but we had to come right then.  And she warned us that the family that was moving out, was still in the process of packing up, so the house wasn't really in it's best form.  But that has never stopped us.  We were not impressed with the outside - a graffiti covered wall, an unkempt garden and a condemned house next door.  It just didn't seem like our new home.  I mentally started moving us into our front runner home (which, coincidentally, is now occupied by my friend E and her family).  And then we walked in and it didn't get much better.  The realtor was right, the house was in disarray - laundry drying on every surface, boxes strewn everywhere, even a trampoline (!) in the basement.  It didn't matter, B was instantly taken with the house.  So I gave it a chance.  And I am so glad I did.  Underneath all of the clutter and dirty grime, was a gem of a house.  One with quite a history, it turns out.

The original house was constructed in the 1620's, in what is still today the  Tejnka village.  The village itself was very small, about 10 houses, and just two streets - U Dvora, where our house sits, and Za Strahovem, the street running just behind us. The laborers who resided here were workers at the St. Marketa Cloister.  The houses were simple structures, ours consisted of two simple rooms and a hall.

When the communists came to Czechoslovakia, they intended to demolish the entire neighborhood (know known as Břevnov) so they could build a block of apartment buildings.  Thankfully, they never got around to it.  But, because they had imposed a construction freeze during this time, by 1989 the entire neighborhood was in very bad shape.  Slowly, and steadily, the houses are being rebuilt and most are now restored. Including ours.

The original structure is still visible in our home and it also has some very unique features- a cellar and a well (more on those as we get to the pictures).  Our backyard also has a hidden tunnel that runs through it, connecting the Cloister to the Prague Castle.  No pictures of that though since we would have to dig it up.

But, enough of the history, let me take you on a tour.  Many of you have been asking to see pictures.   So without further ado, welcome to our home.  It only took me a year from the time we took delivery of our furniture.  

Come on in and look around...

The original house was this area, up to the stairs.  It includes a room off to the left of the archway (next picture) and the rooms off to the right (behind the stairs in the picture is a hallway that houses a guest room and our office - the guest room is the original house)

Those two stone cut outs shown are the walls of the original structure.  Which are still standing over 400 years later.

The hallway to the side rooms.  The office is on the right, the guest room on the left.  It is where you will stay if (when) you come visit us.  It is also part of the original structure.

These rooms at the back of the house were added during the restoration of the house.

And that is most of the main floor.  I didn't add the office, guest room and bathrooms, but you get the idea.  So let's head downstairs to the basement.

Yes, that wrought iron grating (and glass top) is covering a natural spring well.  A well that is INSIDE my basement.  A well that still works and supplies water to the city of Prague.  The well was built in the 1800's, so it is relatively new in relation to the house.  It is 12 meters (almost 40 feet) deep and consistently has about 2 meters (6.5 feet) of water in the bottom.  The stone around it has been replaced by brick, but the original pieces are still used in our garden.  When our landlord had the garbage and grime removed, they found a WWII revolver at the bottom.  

We had the small kitchenette taken out and converted this mother-in-law suite into something a bit more useful for us - a play/coloring/activity room for the kids.

But we still have one more floor to go down.  Into the cellar.  

The cellar pre-dates the building of the house, but no one knows by how many years.  Estimates have it as being over 500 years old but since there are no records of it, no one knows for certain.  What we do know is that the stone walls and floor are original (though the hallway seen in the next two pictures was made by our landlord).  It is believed that the Monks at the Monastery used the cellar to store wine.  We don't keep anything down there, as it is a bit humid, but we do threaten to use it for time out for the girls..They wouldn't mind though, it is their favorite part of the house to show people.

And then we head up to the top floor.  This is where our bedrooms are...

MadHatter somehow got the largest room in the house.  We would have taken it, but it doesn't have the ensuite bathroom, and I am not sharing one with Stinkerbell down the hall, so by default MadHatter laid claim to this monster of a space.  I allowed both girls to pick the theme for their rooms, and the bedding.  They then told me what colors they wanted the walls to be, and I went to work.  MadHatter picked an ocean theme.  She wanted me to paint the whole room blue (as if she was under the sea) but I did not relish the thought of painting that ceiling (and taping off those beams).  Instead we decided the floor was the beach sand, the short walls were the ocean (waves and all) and the white was clouds in the sky.  I do love how it all turned out, and so does she...

Stinkerbell is just down the hall.  She chose the quilt and the purple walls and then just told me to do what I wanted with it.  So I did.  She loves her little oasis.

And the back of the house (before the gardeners came last year)