Blogs from Slovakia, Europe - page 37

Bratislava was quick and dirty. The lonely planet claimed trains left every two hours - this is correct except for the 4 hour break they have between 10am and 2pm, so having missed the early trains, I killed some time on the net before nearly missing the next train. So rocked up at the train station with about 40 mins to spare. killed 15 mins waiting at the wrong ticket booth. I was direct to the international and eventually found it 5 mins later. There was a free counter so went up to it asked about the next train. She yes - but I need to get a number before she would serve me, so I go get a number but then I have to wait for it to be called. At which point the woman ... read more

Well here goes anoararther hit or miss entry. I will have fun finding all these when I get home if they havent gone through. We are in Bratislava an old Austro Hungarian town that became the capital in C14th then lost it then regained it etc for about the next 400 years. It is a quaint town right on the Danube and has some car manufacturers and a bit of crystal making but apparently the whole country is expecting dire consequences when the crunch really come. It is sad to see because they have gone through so much and put alot into trying to become a real member of the E.U. and they might not be pulled out of trouble if it comes. Appparently Hungary is bankrupt at the moment and we have been told to ... read more

www.justgiving.com/3marathonchallenge It's often said that 'breakfast is the most important meal of the day'. Perhaps that explains why we were a tad hungry and disgruntled on arrival in Bratislava. Our hostel in Vienna had served up what appeared to be some form of prison food. As we scooped up our trays and sat down we spent the next 10 minutes working out what the gooey substance on our plates was. It was either very runny scrambled eggs or yellow porridge! The sun was out in Bratislava and that helped to cheer us up somewhat as we wandered to our hotel. There would be no messing about with buses and metros on marathon day this time. Rich had conveniently booked us into a hotel in the city centre. Great, we thought, that is until he explained that ... read more

I got to Kosice by train which is the best and possibly only option to get there directly. It was about 1 euro extra for the fast IC train but it cut about and hour or more off the journey time. It's kind of annoying that all these countries take ISIC but only if you are a student in that country. So far, ISIC has not worked for me in Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia. I keep trying to use it and sometimes they take pity on me and give me an under 26 rate instead but it really is quite useless in Central and Eastern Europe despite the fact that ISIC is supposed to be accepted! Anyway, Kosice is a nice town with a very small old town center. The church is pretty cool ... read more

I never thought I would travel to Slovakia, for one reason or another, but I am so glad we got the opportunity to see it. We were told there really wasn't much to see and to not waste much time there, but we spent an entire day site seeing and visiting the downtown area. First we visited the Devin Castle which was incredible beautiful, not to mention the weather was fantastic! Being in Europe normally predict that the weather is going to be gloomy and rainy, but we really lucked out. We then headed to the downtown area, enjoyed the sites and of course found a pub and grabbed a Slovakian beer. It was a great day trip to Bratislava. ... read more