Tábor

Tábor is a city in South Bohemia 100 km south of Prague. It was founded in 1420 by radical followers of Jan Hus, who paved the way for Martin Luther's church reforms. Much of its old town has been preserved, perched on a hilltop between the Luznice River and the medieval reservoir of Jordan Lake. A big castle, old town hall and other sights remind visitors of its interesting past. Its population in 2019 was over 34,000.

Understand
The town's name translates to "camp" or "encampment" in Czech.

History
The town was founded in the spring of 1420 by Petr Hromádka of Jistebnice and Jan Bydlínský of Bydlín from the most radical wing of the Hussites, who soon became known as the Taborites. In the following years the town flourished as an egalitarian peasant commune. This spirit is celebrated in Smetana's "Song of Freedom", made famous in the English-speaking world by Paul Robeson's recording in Czech and English.

The historical part of the town sits on the summit of an isolated hill separated from the surrounding country by the Lužnice river and by an extensive lake, to which the Hussites gave the biblical name of Jordan. This lake, founded 1492, is the oldest reservoir of its kind in Central Europe. The historical importance of the city of Tábor ceased only when it was captured by King George of Poděbrady in 1452.

Tourist information
The tourist information centre is the at Žižkovo Náměstí 2 in the old town centre.

By car
Tábor lies on the road connecting Prague with České Budějovice and it takes approximately one and a quarter hour to get there. From České Budějovice it takes 50 min.

By bus

 * – It's near the train station.

Buses from Prague to Tábor depart from Roztyly bus station on Metro C (red) line. The ride to Tábor takes 1 hr 20 min. Flixbus departs additionally from the central bus station ÚAN Florenc and has rides from Prague starting at €3.99 (May 2022). The departure times and prices of other bus operators from Prague are covered by the app Busradar. In that app are rides for about shown. This is only the price of a seat reservation of a regional bus. The actual ticket costs about 100 Kč and can be bought from the driver.

By train
From Prague main railway station, there are Express (1hr 17min) and Regional (1hr 25 min) trains operated by the national train operator ČD, providing a roughly hourly service from 6am until midnight. The price is about 149 Kč (May 2022), the same for regional trains and long distance trains. On the Fridays it costs a bit more.



Get around
There are 16 bus lines in Tábor. To get from the main bus and railway station to the historic centre, use one of the frequent city buses to Klokoty. The fare is 18 Kč (May 2022). Or it's 1.2 km (0.7 miles) walking (15 min).

Hiking
There are lots of options for both shorter walks or longer hikes. is a short trail 1.2 km from centre of Tábor. The trails are covered on OsmAnd or Mapy.cz. There are a lot of quite interesting sights which can be reached by hiking. For example, Pribenice castle ruin (follow red hiking trail, which goes along Luznice river valley - 10 km), Hylacka (3.5 km) and Babice (4 km) look-out towers and Kozí Hrádek castle ruin (9 km).

Like elsewhere in Czech Republic, you can best plan your hiking routes through Mapy.cz, which shows the routes in the same colours as the signposts.

Canoeing
Luznice river is a good river for canoeing.

Out of town trips

 * On holidays there are . It's operated by ČD and you can buy tickets on board or at the station at the regular tariff. The platform is in front of the station building, separate from the other tracks.


 * Other pretty towns around like České Budějovice, Písek and Pelhřimov are also just 1 hour by train and the ticket price is 80-100 Kč (May 2022).
 * Other pretty towns around like České Budějovice, Písek and Pelhřimov are also just 1 hour by train and the ticket price is 80-100 Kč (May 2022).

Buy
The ATMs of these banks in the city center do not charge a fee for withdrawing money: fio banka, KB (Komerční banka) and Raiffeisenbank.

For buying groceries, there are Zabka stores around. A bigger variety have the Portaviny Večerka Supermarket in the Old Town, the Billa and Albert in the city center and the Penny supermarket near the train station. All of the named grocery stores have same-day baked goods.



There is a shopping mall:



Budget
in the Old Town:



in the city center:



near the Old Town:



Go next
Your next destination can be some of other pretty towns in South Bohemia and Bohemian-Moravian Highlands - České Budějovice, Písek, Pelhřimov, Jihlava, etc.