Hrusice: Discover Josef Lada, the Church and the Trails

Hrusice combines tangible traces of Josef Lada with a late Romanesque church and two differently designed trails. Here, you can combine cultural history, the museum garden and literary-inspired landscape experiences without the individual destinations losing their distinct character. The church, museum garden and trails each offer their own way of discovering Hrusice.

Church and memorial sites

The Church of St. Wenceslas in Hrusice is a late Romanesque church with an exceptionally richly designed, tiered portal. As an immovable cultural monument, it is listed in the Central Register of Cultural Monuments under registration number 15233/2-2070. Near the church stands a bronze bust of Josef Lada on a high stone pedestal. A winter lime tree estimated to be more than 500 years old also stands beside this memorial bust. This place therefore brings together architecture, commemoration and a historic tree.

The memory of Lada’s origins is also part of the village landscape: In 1958, a memorial plaque was placed on the replacement house at the site of his former birthplace. The birthplace itself had already been demolished in 1932.

The Lada Museum and its garden

Josef Lada’s former villa now serves as a museum. His life, unique illustrations and literary contributions are preserved there. The garden of the Památník Josefa Lady a jeho dcery Aleny museum still includes Josef Lada’s original mushroom forest. In the rear part of the garden there is an arboretum of old fruit varieties, established in 2009. A visit to the museum therefore extends from the former villa through the mushroom forest to the arboretum and the sculptures.

Since 2010, the museum garden has featured sculptures with Lada-inspired themes: “Chlapec s káčou” by Tomáš Havlík, “Lampa” by Hana Nováková, “Pískoviště” by Pavel Charypar and “Lavičky” by Václav Mašek.

Two trails on different scales

The Cesta kocoura Mikeše runs for 25 kilometres from Hrusice to Mukařov and includes 14 stops based on Josef Lada’s story about the cat Mikeš. White signposts and 25 granite kilometre stones mark the route; it can also be divided into several day stages.

More compact is the Pohádkové Hrusice educational trail: It starts and ends in Hrusice, is 4 kilometres long and includes six information panels about the fairy-tale characters and stories of Josef Lada. This gives you both a longer route designed to be completed in stages and a shorter circuit with a fixed starting and ending point to choose from when planning. The two options therefore differ not only in length but also in form: A route from Hrusice to Mukařov is contrasted with a circuit that starts and ends at the same point.

Practical information

Visitors can park in the car park on the square by the church. Toilets for visitors, including an accessible toilet, are available behind the villa. The access code is provided on the admission ticket. This makes it possible to plan the stops at the church and villa separately during the day.

You can also explore other places for your search: Brázdim, Vodochody, Pětihosty, Brandýs nad Labem-Stará Boleslav, Strancice, Kozojedy, Křenice and Podolanka.

To the higher-level travel overview: Okres Praha-Východ.