Letna Park

Letna is a flat-topped plateau above the left bank, laid out as a public park from the 1850s, and the edge of it gives the standard aerial view of Prague: the whole line of bridges across the Vltava in sequence with the old town behind, which is why the terrace and the beer garden along the rim are always full on a warm evening. At the eastern end, on a vast granite plinth, stands a metronome by David Cerny, installed in 1991 and swinging when it is working. The plinth carried something else from 1955 to 1962: the largest group statue of Stalin in the world, fifteen and a half metres high and twenty-two long, blown up with eight hundred kilograms of explosive after de-Stalinisation. The space under it is a warren of chambers, occasionally opened. The park also has the Hanavsky pavilion, a cast-iron structure of 1891, and a large beer garden with the same view.

What you actually see

• The line of bridges - the standard aerial view of Prague from the rim.
• A metronome on a huge plinth - where a seventeen-metre Stalin stood until 1962.
• The Hanavsky pavilion - a cast-iron building of 1891 on the edge.
• A beer garden - along the terrace, busy on any warm evening.

When to go

April to October, evening. Half a day.

Honest expectations

The beer garden is packed on warm evenings and the terrace crowded at sunset. The metronome is not always running. The chambers under the plinth open only occasionally. The climb from the river is steep.

Nearby

The National Technical Museum is behind; Stromovka is north-west.