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fullscreen Beer stop at a pub in Prague, Czech Republic. Now the city wants to attract a different type of tourist. Archive image. Photo: Petr David Josek/AP/TT
The city council in Prague has had enough of over-refreshed tourists. Organized, nocturnal pub crawls in the city are now banned, hoping to attract more “cultured” tourists.
The Czech capital, with a population of 1.3 million, has long been a popular destination for rowdy stag parties and late-night pub crawls, especially among Brits hungry for cheap beer.
It is the guided pub tours between 10pm and 6am – where participants are expected to crawl home – that are banned, explains Deputy Mayor Zdenek Hrib.
The city is calling for more “cultivated, affluent tourists . . . not those who come for a short visit to get drunk,” adds colleague Jiri Pospisil.
The decision is praised by the hotel and restaurant industry. Beer tours to central Prague have posed a problem for both locals and other tourists, the industry association believes.
– I don’t think this will hurt sales. No one is banned from going to the pub, but the nocturnal, organized tours are not something we need, says the head of the trade association Vaclav Starek.