Audioguides České Budějovice

Premysl Otakar II founded Ceske Budejovice as a royal city in 1265 on a flat plain where the Vltava and Malse rivers meet, and he gave it a main square so large that it still feels oversized by any reasonable standard. The Premysl Otakar II Square is one of the biggest in the Czech Republic, lined with Renaissance and Baroque arcaded houses that replaced the ones burned in a fire in 1641. The Samson Fountain at its centre, finished in 1727, is the largest in the country at seventeen metres across. The Black Tower at the corner, a 72-metre bell tower from the 1570s, can be climbed on clear days for views across South Bohemia.

The beer connection is genuine.

The town has brewed since its founding, and in 1895 the Czech joint-stock brewery was established here, later becoming Budvar. The dispute with the American Anheuser-Busch over the Budweiser name has been running in courts around the world since the late 19th century. In most of Europe, Budvar wins those cases and markets its beer as Budweiser. In the United States it cannot. In the pubs around the main square, only one version is on tap and it has been since 1895.