Things to do
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Church of St Mary Magdalene
Twin towers and a curving Baroque front rise on a terrace just above the Hot Spring Colonnade, the work of Kilian Ignaz Dientzenhofer in the 1730s. Inside, the oval nave is bright and white, with gilded altars along the walls. Steps climb to it from the colonnade, and services take priority on Sunday mornings.
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Diana Lookout Tower
A funicular climbs from behind the Grandhotel Pupp to a wooded ridge above the spa valley, where a brick tower and a lift reach a gallery over the forest. Marked trails link the top back down to the colonnades in under an hour. Clear mornings show the Ore Mountains; haze in summer flattens the view.
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Grandhotel Pupp
At the southern end of the spa valley, this grand hotel's long Neo-Baroque front faces the Teplá, and its present building went up around 1900. The film festival makes it its headquarters each July, when rooms go months ahead. The Diana funicular starts just behind it, and the colonnades are a flat walk along the river.
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Hot Spring Colonnade
Behind plate glass in a modern concrete hall, the Vřídlo geyser throws hot mineral water some twelve metres upward, the hottest of the town's springs. Cooled taps along the wall serve it at several temperatures for drinking. Benches inside make the hall a shelter in wet weather, and it fills whenever rain moves over the valley.
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Hotel Imperial
High on a wooded hillside above the town, this tower-topped spa hotel opened in 1912 and stands out on the skyline from the colonnades below. Rooms on the valley side look down over the rooftops. A funicular links it to the centre in a few minutes, and city buses take over once it stops in the evening.
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Jan Becher Museum
Becherovka, the herbal liqueur still made to a closely kept recipe, began in this building on the main shopping street, and its old cellars hold the original oak barrels. Visits run as guided tours of about 40 minutes in small groups, and each one ends with a tasting. Tours must be booked in advance, and the museum is closed on Mondays.
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Market Colonnade
Swiss style carved woodwork, white and lacy, shelters two springs on the slope below the castle tower, put up as a temporary structure in the late nineteenth century and never replaced. Shade and benches make it a pause on the promenade circuit. Its open sides mean it stays cool, and the carving repays a slow look.
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Mill Colonnade
Nearly a hundred Corinthian columns carry this neo-Renaissance promenade along the Teplá, where five mineral springs are piped to stone basins for drinking. Spa guests circle it slowly with porcelain cups, refilling as they walk. The water runs warm and heavily mineral, and a first cup goes down better in small sips.
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Moser Glassworks
Crystal has been blown and cut here since 1857, and the works supplied European courts before it became a name on the town's shop windows. A museum tracks the designs, and timed tours reach the furnace hall where glassblowers work in teams around the heat. Tours run on a fixed schedule and fill in advance, so booking ahead matters.
