Kamenice River Gorges

The Kamenice cuts down to the Elbe at Hrensko through sandstone so tight in places that there is no bank to walk on, and the nineteenth-century solution is still in use: small weirs were built to raise the water, and passengers are carried through the narrows in flat-bottomed boats poled by a ferryman, who talks as he goes. There are two sections, the Edmund gorge, the quiet gorge, nearer Hrensko and the Wild gorge further up, opened in 1890 and 1898 respectively for the Clary-Aldringen family, with paths, galleries and tunnels cut between them by Italian workers. The walls rise fifty to a hundred metres, cold and mossy, with the water green and slow. It is walked as a route from Hrensko up to Mezni Louka, combining both boat sections with the footpath between, and it can be joined with the Pravcicka gate for a full day.

History

The Kamenice Gorge was formed in the Tertiary period, when the sea receded and volcanic activity broke the sandstone layers into many pieces that wind and water then eroded; for people living by the river it was an obstacle, though the Kamenice was used here for fishing and for floating wood. It was first travelled in 1877, when five adventurers bet that they could cross it on a wooden raft, and that event began its use for tourism. From the 1880s Prince Edmund Clary-Aldringen paid to make the area accessible and called in Italian experts, under whom two hundred workers carved pedestrian tunnels in the sandstone. The first navigable section, the Ferdinand Gorge, opened in 1881, with a one-way trip of 2 km from Srbská Kamenice to the Dolský mlýn watermill; the Edmund Gorge followed in 1890, with a restaurant built after it, and the Wild Gorge in 1898. At the beginning of the 20th century an average of 160,000 people came, with fourteen boats in the Edmund Gorge and seven in the Wild Gorge. Strong currents and the difficulty of bringing boats back ended operations in the Ferdinand Gorge in 1939, and the Edmund and Wild gorges were reconstructed in 1964 (Wikipedia, Kamenice Gorge).

What you'll find

• Poled flat-bottomed boats - the only way through the narrowest sections.
• Two gorge sections - Edmund and Wild, opened in 1890 and 1898.
• Cut galleries and tunnels - the nineteenth-century path works between them.
• Fifty to a hundred metre walls - cold, mossy sandstone above green water.

When to go

April to October. Half a day.

Things to know

Boats run seasonally and stop in high water - the gorges close after heavy rain. Queues are long on summer weekends. The walk between sections is a few kilometres. Each boat section is a separate ticket.

Nearby

Pravcicka gate is above; Hrensko sits at the Elbe confluence.

Key facts