Mary’s rock in the southern Pilsen area is made of mudstone. You can enjoy beautiful views from the gazebo at its top

“The lookout here was created sometime around 1838 or before. The wooden gazebo on the rock was built by Count Kristián Vincenc Valdštejn, who owned the forest around Kozel Castle,” says Martin Lang from the Museum of the Middle Hills in Strašice.

From the gazebo on the rock, after climbing a few steps, there are beautiful views, both of the tops of the surrounding trees, and perhaps even of Radyni Castle. However, the current gazebo is a replica. “The original one was swept away by a gale in the 1950s. Since then the rock has been bare. Only a few years ago, the Forests of the Czech Republic produced this successful replica. It can be said that we are here in the heart of nature and at the same time within earshot of civilization,” adds the museum curator with a smile.

Maria’s rock is made of boulders. “That’s such a nice Czech name for a stone, which is otherwise known as lydite internationally. It is an ordinary-looking gray, gray-white, sometimes even red-colored stone. He puzzled us geologists for years, or rather centuries. It is an ancient stone and one of the oldest things that we can encounter on the surface of the Czech massif,” explains Martin Lang.

Buližník comes from a time that is more than 650 million years from the present. For many years, we did not know the way of its formation, but today we already know reliably that the lump formed from hot gels of silicic acid on the sea floor.