Rejviz

Rejviz sits at about seven hundred and seventy metres and is the highest permanently inhabited village in Czech Silesia, a scatter of houses on a plateau in the Jeseniky foothills, and from it a boardwalk runs out into the Rejviz peat bog - the largest in Moravia and Silesia at about four hundred hectares of protected area, a raised bog fed by rainfall with dwarf pine, sundews, cotton grass, cranberry and sphagnum several metres deep. At the end of the boardwalk is the Velke mechove jezirko, the Great Mossy Lakelet, a dark pool of peat-stained water surrounded by floating moss. The boardwalk is the only permitted route and the reason is straightforward: the surface will not carry weight and takes decades to recover from damage. There is a legend about a village swallowed by the bog for its greed, which is the usual story attached to places like this.

The landscape

• The largest bog in Moravia - a raised peat dome fed only by rainfall.
• A boardwalk route - the only permitted way across the surface.
• The Great Mossy Lakelet - dark peat water ringed by floating moss.
• The highest Silesian village - Rejviz itself at about 770 metres.

When to go

May to September. Half a day.

Before you go

Stay on the boardwalk - the peat will not hold weight and does not recover. Mosquitoes are bad. The site is subtle rather than spectacular. Winter access is limited and the boardwalk ices.

Nearby

Zlate Hory and its gold-mining trail are north; Jesenik is west.

Key facts