In some of the previous puzzle waypoints, we mentioned that Prague is situated in the valley of the Vltava River. It is indeed a valley with elevated banks that provide a natural opportunity for panoramic views of the city. We have already been to the top of Vítkov Hill (
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"The parks between the Edvard Beneš Embankment and the Letná Plain were among the first public parks of a promenade nature. They spread on 25 ha. In the past, they used to be called the Letná Hill, which means a hill facing the summer, i.e. the Southern side. As the Chotek’s Park has already been connected with the Royal Garden, there was now a chance to walk from the lower part of Holešovice via a green park all the way to Prague Castle and then on past Strahov, Petrín, and all the way to Smíchov. There used to be vineyards on the Letná slope, and the Letná Plain was often used as an army camp. In 1635, a chapel of St. Mary Magdalene was built at the foot of the hill, and it was transferred to its present-day location in relation with the traffic modifications at the end of the Cech’s Bridge in the 50s. In 1716, Count Valdštejn built a chateau here, which he called Belvedér. The French armies blasted it away during their withdrawal in 1742. The name Belvedér was then incorrectly transferred to the Queen Anne’s Summer House at Prague Castle. After the death of the owner of most of the land plots, Jakub Wimmer, the Letná plains began to become desolate. From the 1860s on, the City of Prague began buying out the land plots in order to establish a public park. The park was established according to a project of artistic gardener Bedrich Wünscher and Jirí Braul. The modifications culminated by building a new-Renaissance restaurant according to an architect Vojtech Ullmann in 1863. Today, the restaurant is named Belcredi, after Count Richard Belcredi, a governor in Bohemia form 1864 on, after whom a street was named, today the Milada Horáková’s Avenue. The building is called Letná Chateau. Not far away in the direction of the National Technical Museum, there is an interesting curiosity - an old carousel with wooden horses in a decoratively carved wooden pavilion. The horses are overlaid with genuine horse skin with no seams from heads to hooves. There are four cars and twenty one horses on the carousel. It was brought here from Královské Vinohrady from the coaching inn Na Kravíne in 1894. It was functional without major repairs until 1995, when it was partially restored. In 2004, the National Technical Museum purchased it to include it in its collections, and a general reconstruction is planned."
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