The Moravian Karst/Moravsky Kras is the best-known and most extensive Karst area in Central Europe. More than 1,000 caves are known to exist across an area of approximately 100 square kilometers. Four of these have been made accessible to the public. In 1956, the Moravian Karst was declared a protected landscape area.
The standout cave tour is the full tour of the Punkva, or Punkevní, Caves. The first part of the tour is a walk through several caverns of quite impressive stalagmites, stalactites, and other formations and along long, narrow tunnels between caverns. You will also visit the bottom of the Macocha Abyss, the deepest abyss in the Czech lands. The highlight of the tour, though, is climbing into flat-bottomed boats to cruise for 450 metres along the twists and loops of the underground Punkva River.
The guide might call out "watch your head on the right" or "watch your hands on the left" if the walls of the tunnels get a bit too close. At one point, you climb out of the boat to see the Masaryk Cave, which is described by the guides as the most impressive cavern of the Punkva Caves. I see no reason to disagree. The boat cruise may be shortened in the spring months or in the days following heavy rains.
The price in 2004 was 100Kc for adults and 50Kc for students. Apparently, the tickets can be all sold out a week in advance in the busy season, so it may be wise to call ahead. If people have reserved tickets and not arrived to collect them, they are on sale just before each tour. The entrance is inside the ticket office, and you can only go in with a guided tour. The tour guides may not speak your first language, but you're likely to have a recorded description to play on the PA system.
Getting there is a bit of a pain in the neck. It’s necessary to check the times carefully and be a little flexible. In October 2004, we took the bus to Brno and changed there to the train to Blansko. At Blansko, we discovered that the bus to Skalní Mlýn stops running after the end of September, which would explain why we found no mention of it on the Internet timetables at www.vlak-bus.cz. Luckily, there were enough of us to split the 200Kc taxi fare into affordable portions. From Skalní Mlýn there is still a 15- to 20-minute walk along the road to the caves’ entrance, so you may wish to have the taxi driver take you all the way. There’s only one taxi company in Blansko; they speak Czech. A phrasebook would be a particularly good companion on this daytrip. It’s also possible to hike from the Blansko train station along the green-marked trail; the sign says 7km, but you should be able to reduce that with some imaginative shortcuts.
After leaving the caves, we took the cable car up to see the abyss from the top, had hot dogs and langoše at the refreshment stand, and hiked the 2km to Vilémovice to catch the bus home from there.
A great day trip from Olomouc!