Macocha Gorge

The Macocha Abyss is a collapsed sinkhole in the Moravian Karst, 138.5 metres deep to the surface of the lake at its bottom — the deepest chasm of its kind in Central Europe. It measures about 174 by 76 metres, wide enough for daylight to reach the floor, which puts it in the category of "light hole" abysses. Beneath the two lakes at the bottom, divers have followed flooded spaces to a total depth of about 187 metres. The underground Punkva River runs through it, and the abyss forms part of the Punkva Caves system.

The name comes from the Czech word for stepmother. According to legend, which was first written down in 1793, a stepmother threw her stepson into the chasm; the boy survived by catching on the rock just below the edge, and the villagers who rescued him threw her in instead. The abyss is mentioned in documents from 1663, and the first person known to have reached the bottom was Lazar Schopper in 1723. Scientific descents followed from 1784, and the karst researcher Karel Absolon began a new era of exploration in 1901. The Punkva Caves were discovered in 1909, the bottom of the abyss was linked by a dry route in 1914, and the route along the underground river was opened in 1933.

Visitors can look down from two viewing bridges on the rim: the upper one, built in iron in 1882, and the lower one, rebuilt in 2001. A glacial relict flower, Cortusa matthioli, grows on the walls. The best way to understand the abyss, however, is from below, on the Punkva Caves tour, which emerges at the floor of Macocha. A cable car built by Doppelmayr has linked the caves with the rim since 1995, and a steep path about 1 km long, the Salm trail, does the same on foot.

Getting there

Macocha lies in Vilémovice municipality, about 6 km from Blansko and 20 km north of Brno. Brno–Tuřany Airport (BRQ) is about 25 km away. Cars must be left at the car park at Skalní mlýn, from where a road train covers the 2 km to the Punkva Caves; there is also parking near the upper bridge.