A day at the Archeopark, part II

Hello!

Please find part I here. You can also pull up the map there. I now plan on splitting this post into three parts. Part II will also be a more overview and orientation post, and part III will finally delve into the culture and lodging in more depth.


Continuing where we left off, crossing the bridge to the Acropolis, you can see the palisades in detail now.

(Okay, I'm cheating, this was taken from the access road with a zoom lens, just downhill from the bridge. Thus the palisades look properly imposing.)


Entering the acropolis then, we see a few houses on the north end.

It is important to note that during re-creating the fortress, they only built three houses; one of each type they found here. There were originally far more houses. I also learned that they have only uncovered about 20% of the area. Because of this, they have not actually found a longhouse, but they know it should be here based on findings from similar fortresses in the area. More on the housing in part III.


So, turning 180 and facing the gate through which we entered, we can see the main part of the defenses.

On the right, at the edge of the photo, you can see a rising hill of earth. This is untouched ground, left for future archeologists and technology to explore. I plan on returning to the Archeopark every time I return to Eastern Europe (hopefully every year) and seeing what else has been discovered.



Next, a quick peak at the west wall:

Hidden behind the ramparts is the side gate, at the top of the access road. The Archeopark uses this as an exit for the tourists, which is a shame since I wanted to go through the main gate again ;)


Moving on, if you would join me on the east wall:


We can look down and see the beautiful construction.


Yes, those are wood logs along the floor, cut in half, and alternating between flat and rounded sides. Beautiful, no?

In addition to this solid construction, the space under the floor was completely filled with stones. That way, when something solid struck the wall, it would not easily collapse. Even so, I would not want to be one of the people charged with moving all those stones!



Next, another look across the Acropolis, this time from the wall.



Turning to the East now, we have an excellent view of the valley:


And we can walk along the wall and look south, over the first Předhradí (and down at the access road):



Lastly, a view from the wall down to the front gate:



Thus concludes part II. I hope you enjoyed the walk-through. Part III will be up soon.