Olomouc, Czechia

Olomouc sits on the Morava River in eastern Czechia and is home to roughly 100,000 residents who preserve the legacy of a city that once served as the historical capital of Moravia. The Upper Square anchors the old center with the UNESCO-listed Holy Trinity Column, a 35-meter limestone monument completed in 1754 that ranks as the largest free-standing baroque sculpture in central Europe. The nearby Town Hall houses a 15th-century astronomical clock reworked in 1955 with a socialist-realist mosaic, while Palacký University, founded in 1573, stands as the second-oldest university in the country. The Premyslid castle site still carries the Romanesque Saint Wenceslas Cathedral from 1109.