The Secrets of
Karlovy Vary

Where Emperors Bathed and Empires Sipped the Waters

A hunting dog leaps from a cliff and plunges into scalding water. The year is roughly 1350, and Emperor Charles IV has just stumbled upon the hot springs that will bear his name\u2014Karlovy Vary, the King\u2019s Bath.

For nearly seven centuries, Europe\u2019s elite have walked these colonnades, sipping mineral water from porcelain cups and pretending it doesn\u2019t taste like warm pennies. Goethe came thirteen times. Beethoven composed here. Peter the Great bathed here twice. And in 2006, James Bond checked into the Grandhotel Pupp and never looked back.

Today you\u2019ll trace 650 years of history through pastel fa\u00e7ades, Baroque churches, Bohemian crystal, and a herbal liqueur that locals call the 13th spring.