Toulovcovy Mastale

Toulovcovy mastale is a small sandstone rock area in the Bohemian-Moravian highlands where the plateau has been cut into a network of narrow ravines, clefts and overhangs, and it takes its name from Vaclav Toulovec, a fifteenth-century knight of Trebova who according to local tradition used the rock chambers as stables - mastale means stables - and hid there. The reserve covers about a thousand hectares of forest with the rock formations scattered through it, and marked circuits run between them past named features: the Bear's Den, the Devil's Pulpit, the Toulovcova rokle. Passages are narrow and some are stepped and laddered. It is much smaller and much quieter than the Bohemian Paradise or the Adrspach rocks, which is its main advantage. Nearby Budislav has a rock chapel and Prosec a small museum. The trails link into a longer network across the highlands.

What you actually see

• Narrow sandstone ravines - a cut network of clefts and overhangs in the plateau.
• Named rock features - the Bear's Den, the Devil's Pulpit and others.
• The Toulovec legend - a fifteenth-century knight said to have stabled horses here.
• Quiet trails - far less visited than the better-known rock cities.

When to go

April to October. Half a day.

Honest expectations

The formations are small compared with Adrspach or Hruba Skala. Passages are narrow and slippery when wet. Signage is modest. Services in the villages are minimal.

Nearby

Litomysl and its chateau are twenty kilometres north-east.