Along the Znojmo Wine Trail – Cycling through region whose history was inspired by wine

Route tracking:

Znojmo – Havraníky – Šatov – Chvalovice - Vrbovec – Slup – Jaroslavice – Hrádek – Dyjákovice – Hevlín - Jevišovka

Characteristics:

The Moravian Wine Trail connects the ancient town of Znojmo with Uherské Hradiště, the capital of Slovácko region. It offers cycling through a region boasting its good wine, rich history and living tradition. There are 70 wine villages along the trail, ten preserved nature sites and the most significant historical and architecture sights of the region.

Route parameters:

Route difficulty: Turista
Length: 66,8 km
Choosing the right bicycle: Krosové
Tourist area: Znojemsko a Podyjí
Maximum / minimum altitude: m.s.l. / m.s.l.
Total elevation: m
Total of vertical meters ascended: m

Description:

The Moravian Wine Trail, which is a backbone route across wine-bearing Moravia, runs across all wine sub-regions. It crosses seven of the ten regional wine trails. The trail starts in the centre of Znojmo close to an obelisk with the statue of Nike, Goddess of Victory on Comenius Square (Komenského náměstí). You will find its beginning in the middle of the park Husovy sady. It is marked with a sign depicting a red colour wine-cellar porch. After a short descent through the park you will ride 1 km along a 1st class road. The busy traffic and noise of the town fades away as you ride along the Loucká Street around the Premonstratensian Monastery. You will come to a bridge over The Dyje River, which is the gate to a significant wine village Nový Šaldorf-Sedlešovice. Behind the village the trail turns off from the road Znojmo – Retz. There you will face the first climb up to Konice. Descend to Popice, ride across the village and you will get to a lovely heathland Havranické vřesoviště. As you will be crossing it over, which is rather technically challenging, you enter the National Park Podyjí. On this rocky trail you will pass a chapel, crosses and a wayside shrines with inscriptions in both Czech and German – documents of the long common history. As you come to Staré vinice (old vineyards) above Havraníky, you will be awaited by an oasis – a wine tasting kiosk run by the company Znovín Znojmo. Among a dozen of samples you can try an exquisite cuvee Charles Sealsfield, reminiscent of Karel Postl, a famous native writer from Popice. The plateau above Havraníky is an ideal starting point for a short detour to the legendary vineyard Šobes.  

 

As you pass Havraníky, the trail is turning off to Šatov. You will pass almost all wine cellars in the village when you ride along the trail. However you will need to make a short detour to get to the most famous one – the Painted Cellar. On the ascending stretch from Šatov to the state border with Austria, the Moravian Wine Trail runs past a military bunker, part of the Czechoslovak fortification system (constructed before World War II). In the vineyard Nad Peklem take in a wonderful view over Austrian and Moravian wine villages. Reportedly, on fair-weather days even the Alps can be seen. Along the state border you ride in a rolling country. Then the trail is turning off and you cycle along the so called “signálka”, (term used for roads used for maintaining the Iron Curtain) in the direction to Chvalovice. There, it joins up with a long-distance cycle trail Greenway from Prague to Vienna, both continuing in parallel to Načeratice. You may enjoy this flat section of the trail running along a road by visiting the Lampelberk Castle. Its round tower offers sweeping views over the countryside. You can also taste wines in the Ampelos company wine centre in Vrbovec.

 

The following section will give you a clear image of the sad history of Moravian borderlands that suffered hard from the expulsion of Germans after the war and the subsequent communist devastation. The once rich region is struggling to find again its lost face. As you zoom across the lowland countryside the trail will take you to a unique Renaissance water mill with a mill-race in Slup. The castle in Jaroslavice is a silent witness of its mismanagement by the former Czechoslovak People’s Army. As you pass the castle the trail is turning off the road, you pass a short section along the bank of a lake and a poplar tree avenue, approaching Hrádek. Before the village notice a repaired Neo-Gothic chapel built in 1906, which was dedicated to St. Agnes of Bohemia. Before you set out for the final 10-kilometre long section to Hevlín, be sure to stop on the uphill at the edge of Hrádek. Behind the enclosing wall of the late Baroque church of St. Peter and Paul you will find a unique Romanesque rotunda of St. Oldřich that has been mentioned as early as in the mid 11th century. In Dyjákovice the trail is turning off onto a “signálka” road and along a quiet tarmac surface road it will take you to Hevlín.

 

From the nearby village of Jevišovka you can get a train connection to Znojmo or Břeclav. If you take an extra six kilometre ride you will be rewarded by visiting two new picnic sites along the Greenways that were created by the sculptor Josef Zahradník from Ivančice, and by sights in the village situated at the confluence of the rivers Dyje and Jevišovka. The village is dominated by the Church of St. Kunhuta with its original Gothic tower. The church aisle was rebuilt in the 1930s. Small religious monuments in the village were repaired in the middle of the last decade. The Baroque statue of St. John of Nepomuk is a National Monument.

  

Recommended points of interest:

Znojmo: urban historic area, Rotunda of St. Catherine, Louka Monastery

Havraníky: vineyard Šobes

Šatov: protected zone of village architecture, Painted cellar, military bunker – part of Czechoslovak military fortification

Slup: Renaissance water mill, Museum of Czechoslovak military fortification 1938

Jaroslavice: lakes

Hrádek: Rotunda of St. Oldřich