Sokol festival concludes in Prague

Prague, July 6 (CTK) - The 15th national Sokol (Falcon) two-day exercise has ended, long live the 16th exercise in 2018, Hana Mouckova, head of the Czech Sokol Association, said Friday.

Some 10,500 gymnasts from inside and outside the Czech Republic took part in 11 various exercises.

The exercise is called Slet, which roughly corresponds to the mass meeting of birds.

The gymnasts thus celebrated the 150th anniversary of the foundation of Sokol in 1862.

On Thursday, the exercises were held in a heavy rain, but Friday the sun was shining on Prague.

Friday, the audience could see the Sokol film festival 2012. With the sounds of film melodies, the mass exercises were started, like yesterday, by the elderly, some of whom were over 90.

They were followed by mass exercises of men and then of women, all of them wearing the traditional Sokol costumes.

Gymnast Vlasta Balzerova was 90. She already took part in the 1938 national Sokol Slet and in all the subsequent ones.

At the close of the exercise, flags of the Czech Republic and the Czech Sokol Association were solemnly lowered.

At the end, the gymnasts pledged to come for another Slet in six years.