Day 7 - Vienna to Zilina via Trencin (Slovakia)

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We have to be out of our hotel room by 11am, which is not the earliest start we've had, but it’s early enough, especially as the bratwurst we had last night has been wrecking havoc on my poor digestive system. I knew there was a reason we weren't friends, but the vast amount of beer washed down with it can't have helped much either. We've no food in for breakfast again, so have to make do with a tin of peaches (from our food bag) eaten by hand of course as we have no cutlery. To spice things up we add the luxury addition of a yoghurt drink. At least we should be on budget for food!



I decide it’s my turn to take over the driving for this part of the trip and Greg will be navigating which could be fun. We don't even make it past the first turn off before Greg has given the wrong directions. So we head back in a big loop of Vienna and start again. This seems to be an occurring theme for Vienna. Eventually we manage to escape the ring road around the city and are on our way to Trencin in Slovakia. As we reach the border for Slovakia, we notice the border security police stopping cars and checking them. We have a funny feeling they are going to stop us and sure enough they pull us over. We don’t panic as we have nothing to hide, even though the police officer looks over every aspect of our car with a torchlight while I can’t help thinking ‘jobsworth’. Turns out the reason we have been stopped is because we do not have a toll sticker displayed on our windscreen, (we are meant to know this apparently, even though no one has mentioned to us before that we need one, and every sign at the toll roads has been in German and there hasn't been any places signalled where we can buy one. The officer is not even willing to let up on us a little bit, even though he can clearly see we are British and genuinely hadn't realised we had done anything wrong, and fines us 120 euros. I am so fuming I have to really control myself not to start yelling at him for being so unreasonable, but I hold it together simply telling him I am not happy and it's an absolute disgrace that they make money from foreigners like this. But he exclaims that they are entitled to fine up to 3000 euros if they see fit, so I close my mouth and dash off before he changes his mind. I can understand that they should fine people who are trying to act wide and avoid paying, but surely a little common sense would prevail here? Or at least have better signage in place to show where and when to buy this bloody sticker. Anyway, rant over and take note if you are ever travelling through Austria by car! (And you can buy them at petrol stations just so you know). We cross the Slovakian border shortly after, with a sour taste in our mouth. Vienna may be beautiful, but the people certainly haven’t been. Although we’ve heard great things about Trencin, we're a bit too pissed off to notice much. It's also peeing down with rain which doesn't help our mood. We half-heartedly attempt to take some pictures of the castle but that’s about all we can muster.



We set off for Zilina at the north of Slovakia. It was an interesting choice made purely on the basis that it was listed on Google maps, and it looked relatively nice from the pictures. When we get there, we notice that google images have been rather over kind in their pictures, as it resembles more of an old, industrial communist town rather than containing the quaint chalets and rivers we saw on the Internet. However, our hotel seems really nice, even if it does face onto a dodgy looking housing estate. We are delighted to discover the hotel has a sauna, it's exactly what I told Greg an hour ago that I wished the hotel had. We ask reception about it, and they happily book us in for a private 2 hour session in half an hour, happy days. Once settled in our room we head to the sauna and half bake ourselves for nearly 80 minutes. It's bliss even though we look like a pair of pickled beet roots by the time we emerge. As Zilina doesn't really look like the culinary capital of the world, we eat in the hotel restaurant and order two house specialities of pork legs and pancakes. What we get is a feast of pork cooked with peppers in a sweet and sour type sauce, sandwiched amongst 3 potato rosti cakes. It is amazing and our whole meal including drinks comes to a grand total of 15 euros. It somewhat makes up for our fine earlier. Back up to our hotel room we watch some more tv then bed.

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Photos

Trencin Castle
Blink and you miss it