Letna Park

The most famous thing in Letna Park is something that isn't there anymore. From 1955 to 1962, the largest Stalin monument in the world stood on the park's western bluff overlooking the Vltava — a 15.5-meter granite sculpture of Stalin leading a procession of workers and soldiers. It took 600 workers two years to build and cost the equivalent of a small hospital. Then, after Khrushchev's denunciation of Stalin, the Czechoslovak government dynamited it in 1962. Today, a giant metronome by artist Vratislav Novak ticks on the empty pedestal — a commentary on the passage of time and the impermanence of political monuments.

The park itself is Prague's favorite hilltop escape. A long plateau of mature trees, beer gardens, and winding paths stretches above the river, offering what might be the single best panoramic view of Prague's bridges. Stand at the western viewpoint and you can count five bridges spanning the Vltava below you in a single glance, with the Old Town skyline rising behind them.

Letna Beer Garden — a simple open-air operation with plastic chairs and cold Gambrinus on tap — is one of the great unpretentious drinking spots in Europe. No table service, no cocktails, no nonsense. Just cheap Czech beer and a billion-dollar view. Locals come here after work, on weekends, and on any evening when the weather is halfway decent.

The park also played a starring role in the Velvet Revolution. On November 25, 1989, an estimated 750,000 people gathered on the Letna Plain for the largest demonstration in Czechoslovak history. Two weeks later, the communist government fell. The park has been a symbol of freedom ever since.