Rakovník

Rakovnik grows the soul of the world's beer. The hop gardens of the Rakovník region — with neighbouring Žatec, the Saaz terroir — supply the aromatic cones that give Czech lager its bitterness and its perfume; the poles and wires of the hop fields stripe the countryside like vineyards of the north, and the town has brewed its own conclusion since 1454, when the Bakalář brewery's charter was granted — beer older than the discovery of America, still poured on the square. That square is one of Bohemia's largest, a long marketplace anchored by two Gothic gate towers, the Prague Gate and the High Gate, survivors of the medieval walls, with the church of St Bartholomew's tower completing the trio of verticals over the red roofs.

The town's crafts diversified with the centuries — Rakovník's ceramics and its soap works wrote themselves into Czech households — and its cultural life keeps the register the concert record describes: the municipal cultural centre, churches, choirs, the art school's concerts and visiting ensembles, sustained by a community for whom the brass band and the mixed choir are infrastructure. An hour from Prague but a century calmer, ringed by the hunting forests of Křivoklát's royal castle: Rakovnik is Bohemia concentrated — hops, Gothic, and the patience both require.