Herold beer has had a long and winding path over the past few years. Less than a decade ago it was found fairly often in expat hangouts like the Globe, though not always in the best condition, and sometimes in downright terrible condition. Although things had markedly improved by the time Michael Jackson came to Prague to promote Herold in late 2004, the brand’s image had been damaged by the occasional bad pints from before.

And yet Herold was making great beers, including one of the country’s first widely distributed wheat beers, the first Czech dark wheat most of us had ever seen, and a full line of quality lagers, including what must have been the country’s best bottled dark. They were always a bit hard to find in Prague, but then they became much harder to find, until only a couple of places carried the beer by the time I was finishing Good Beer Guide Prague and the Czech Republic.

One of them was the Dívčí skok restaurant in Prague’s Divoká Šárka park, a favorite setting for hiking and sunbathing. When the temperatures moved up earlier this summer, I went out there to have a pint.

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