Bratislava

We packed a lot into our one day in Bratislava, Slovakia.

We arrived in Bratislava last evening around 6:30. We are staying in a very nice three bedroom apartment near the Old Town.

We set out last night to find something for dinner, but nothing was open! In Poland (and I guess here, too) Christmas and the day after are both holidays where stores and restaurants are closed. The 26th is St. Stephen's Day and is traditionally spent visiting friends and family. Slovakia is over 60% Catholic so religious traditions here are common. We walked and walked. Finally we gave up and stopped in at the McDonald's that was open. There were a lot of people there~~probably because there was nothing else open! So the kids were thrilled with their first meal in Bratislava.

We headed out this morning to see the sights. Slovakia has a population of about five million in the entire country. Bratislava is the capital and the largest city with about 450,000 people. That is the same size as Gdansk. Slovakia is also celebrating the 20th anniversary of the fall of communism this year. 2009 has been a wonderful milestone year for all of the countries formerly under soviet rule.

It was pretty chilly here today (around 32 degrees). We have misplaced Trey's stocking cap. I still think it is here somewhere, but we have not run across it yet. In the meantime we found him a warm toque to wear so he and Myles make the fashion statements for our family.

We went to Mass at the Cathedral of St. Martin. It is quite beautiful and now we have been to a Mass in Slovakian! They were getting ready for some event there and we were hurried out after mass. So we continued our sightseeing. There are lots of unique statues here and we enjoyed seeing them. There is a guy leaning on a bench, a guy with a top hat and this guy coming out of a manhole.

We walked up a big hill to the Bratislava castle. The view of the Danube River and the city was beautiful. It would have been even prettier if it had been warmer, but we're here in December. We can't expect great weather in the middle of winter! You can see several communist style apartment buildings on the other side of the river in the background.

After sightseeing for quite a while we stopped in a coffee shop for a yummy hot chocolate break.

Ben started having a headache this afternoon so we decided to come on back to the apartment to rest a while so it didn't get any worse. We hung out for about an hour and a half. Ben was feeling better so we went out to a Slovakian restaurant. Everyone enjoyed the food: chicken, pork with dumplings, the national dish of Slovakia Bryndzové Halušky--potato dumplings with sheep's milk cheese and bacon. We are in for the evening and are watching Pretty Woman in Slovakian!

Tomorrow we take a train for three hours to Budapest.