August 25th-Our morning began with the hotel breakfast. Our hopes were high for a new winner in the Hotel Breakfast Category, but the Park Inn Danube in Bratislava is still in the lead by a lot. The breakfast was good and then we headed out to meet our next tour. We signed up for a Castle and Jewish Quarter tour. We lucked out with a smart tour guide, Blanca, and a small tour (7 in total with Blanca). We met the group at the Charles Bridge and quickly got going. We headed over the bridge as Blanca explained some of the features of this 14th Century bridge. Every ten feet or so, there is a Saint Statue and there are "crap" vendors and street performers competing for your attention. We did stop by the statue of ... read more

August 23- Last night we finally figured out that the windows do actually open in our hotel room. It was nice to have some fresh air in our room for a change and we slept better. ( A side note... our window opens to the back courtyard of the hotel. Any noise made echos very loudly thru the entire courtyard. I was desperately trying to seek out the man who has bad post nasual drip and was coughing every night for hours. I wanted to give him some allergy meds badly.)  We got ourselves ready and headed for the hotel breakfast. So far, the best hotel award goes to the Royal Park Inn in Budapest, but the Best Breakfast Spread award goes to the Park Inn Danube in Bratislava. We ate quickly and made our way ... read more

August 21-Our goal this morning was to make it to the Hungarian Parliament Tour in English at 10am. We should have read our Ricky (Rick Steeves) better, because by the time we got ourselves into the city, the line for tickets was huge and they sold out before we got one. After this change in plans, we floundered for a bit before catching our course again. We left the Parliament and then tried to hurry to catch the subway to get to a bus tour of Momento Park which is a park just outside town of all of the old communist statues. "We just missed it" (That's for you, amy)... so then we had to re-plan again. We decided to try to find out if the Great Market in Budapest was open on Sunday, even though ... read more

August 19th-Today we enjoyed our Slovakian Breakfast at the Park Inn on the Danube. The breakfast spread was very extensive and we both enjoyed the chocolate dip for the croissants. After breakfast, we headed straight for the New Bridge UFO lookout. This bridge was constructed during Communist times. They displaced several hundred homes in the Jewish quarter to put in a major highway.... the only problem is that they ran it right in front of the St.Martin's Cathedral, a  Coronation Church for the Slovakian Kings.... which is now crumbling because of the vibration of the highway. The UFO lookout is a restaurant and a overlook on the city. At the top we got wonderful views of the castle, the old town, and new section of Bratislava. Also from this height, we could see Austria, Hungary, and ... read more

August 16-17-Our flight left syracuse at 4pm and we headed for Boston. there was nothing spectacular about the flight. once in Boston, we grabbed a bite to eat and made our way to the gate. The international terminal in Boston is quite posh and I enjoyed the access to a plug to charge my "Electronic toys" as my mom would call them. We boarded our next flight to Munich on Lufthansa airlines. The plane was very nice and included a "downstairs" area that was primarily for restrooms. Each of our seats had our own TV, and I was tempted to watch a movie in German just to prepare myself. The stewardesses were generally nice, except the one who was stationed to our area... she was very short with us. I have to say the service was ... read more