Category: Slovakia

Today was a laid back day in the Tokaj Wine region in Slovakia. The Tokaj Wine Region is actually a famous Hungarian wine region, but a small part of it spills into Slovakia. We were not quite ready to leave Slovakia so we decided to head here today.

We found a very well reviewed campground in the wine region and headed out in the morning for Mali Bara. We needed fuel and as we were driving out of Kosice I told Ton we were going to stop at the next gas station. We passed one near the campground in Kosice but thought we could do better on the price. Before we knew it we were into a beautiful countryside and ended up driving the hour to our campground in Mali Bara without seeing another gas station. When we arrived at the campground I told the person at reception we needed diesel and he told us there was a station nearby.

We decided to head over to the station before setting up. After about 15 minutes we pulled into the station but before we could get to a pump the attendant said that they do not sell fuel to vehicles with foreign license plates only Slovak plates. He was apologetic about it, but unbending. I asked him where I could get fuel and his first answer was Hungary. I told him I wanted fuel in Slovakia and he said there was a Shell station about 25 minutes away, and showed me on google maps which one it was. Apparently some companies are restricting purchases for foreign vehicles because there was a run on Slovak gas stations near the Polish border, we are far from the Polish border, and google says fuel is cheaper in Hungary than Slovakia so they aren’t crossing to buy fuel here. Fortunately the drive was on a good road with pretty countryside so we enjoyed ourselves.

We returned and settled into our campground for the day. We asked about wine tasting and were told there was a place walking distance. We headed up there and found a very nice restaurant full of young people on bicycles. We enjoyed a nice meal purchased a bottle of wine and headed back to François for a relaxing afternoon.

Kosice is the second largest city in Slovakia, and until we arrived in Bratislava I didn’t know it existed. It has a population of about 230,000, and historically has bounced between Hungary and Slovakia with a hundred years of Ottoman rule. Today the population is overwhelmingly Slovak.

Our first stop was St. Elizabeth’s Cathedral which is the Easternmost Cathedral in the Roman Catholic Church. Like most Cathedrals it is an imposing site in the center of town and is one of two buildings located in the center of the long rectangle that is the center of the city.

The interior was nice and we enjoyed looking at the art from several different eras of the church. Much of the interior artwork appeared to have been done by Hungarian artists as they dominated the town when the Cathedral was last renovated.

We have noticed that one unique feature of Slovak towns outside of Bratislava is the lack of a large town square. Instead there is a long but rectangular center of the town that is formed by townhouses with occasional gates to allow access to surrounding streets. The only buildings inside the rectangle seem to be the main church and a government building. In the case of Kosice this rectangular center is over a kilometer in length.

In the case of Kosice this Kilometer was all that got our attention. We walked up and down it a few times, stopping once at a very posh coffee shop in a hotel, and once in a brewery that dated back to 1521.

After a few hours walking the market kilometer, and a few of the streets surrounding it, we were tired and headed back to François. Kosice retains much more of the “Brutalist” architecture of the communist era than Bratislava. It may also mean that a lot more of the older buildings were demolished during that period. The older 19th century buildings are much more “charming” than the block concrete buildings of the communist era and may have led to our inability to find a reason to venture out from the center.

On the tram ride back to François Ton and I agreed that Kosice was a nice city, but a little bit uninspiring. We had originally planned on two days, but are now considering shifting to a small wine region near the Hungarian border for our last day in Slovakia on this trip.

We were off to an early start. The weird Aire we stayed in did not lend itself to lingering so we were both ready to go quite early. The drive to our destination of Levoca was pretty short so we found ourselves parking at the base of the walls of the city before 10:30.

Levoca was part of Hungary until 1918. But avoided most wars from the middle ages on, so the town and its walls are well preserved. It was a major market town, but it was bypassed the railroad in 1871 so it became a backwater which led to the town staying largely unchanged.

What was a problem in the 19th century is now an asset in the 21st century. The town is now a UNESCO site because the town contains so many old buildings.

The town is small and easily walkable in a couple of hours. We noticed that St. James Bascilliaca had a guided tour at 11:30 so we wandered around the square. The day was bright blue, but the temperatures were in the low 50’s and the wind was really howling so we were happy when the tour began.

St. James is one of the newest Basilicas in the Catholic church having just been made a Basilica by Pope John Paul in 1995. The church dates back to the 1300’s but is famous for its gigantic Gothic wooden altar. It stands over 70 feet tall and is carved wood that is painted. There are no nails used in the structure which is amazing.

Unfortunately the tour guide didn’t speak English. She escorted us into the church and gave us a written guide in English, but to compensate said Ton could take pictures despite the no photography signs. Ton was in heaven. In the end the lady broke out her limited English mixed with German to give us some details about the church which was very nice.

After the church we headed back to François for the trip to our final destination in Kosice. As we were driving we discussed visiting Spis Castle, but as we were approaching the exit we decided it was way to windy to climb on another castle so we settled for a picture from the freeway.

As we were driving Ton told me that Slovakia has the most castles per capita in Europe. The countryside in Eastern Slovakia is really beautiful, with large valleys surrounded by high mountains. The towns are often dominated by large block Communist era apartments. Even small towns have multi-story apartments, and they often dominate the skyline of the town. The Slovaks are doing their best to pretty them up with paint, but they are pretty monotonous in such a beautiful countryside.

Slovakia is not a large country in size so our drives have been relatively short. Today we took our longest drive of our visit at about 2 hours. But the drive was really beautiful crossing thru two national parks in the Tatra Mountains. While the drive was in the mountains, the roads were generally good and we made decent time.

We visited two places that were very different in size though they both exist because of mining. Banska Bystrica is a thriving town of 80,000 in a river valley, and Spania Dolina is a rural village of 200 people tucked away in the hills.

The first place we stumbled across was the Museum of the Slovak Uprising. Banska Bystrica was the center of anti-Nazi resistance in Slovakia during WWII and rebelled against the Nazi’s in late August 1944. They managed to hold the town for nearly 2 months before losing it to the Germans and fading into the countryside to fight as partisans.

The museum had a nice display of Soviet and German WWII vehicles that I enjoyed walking thru while Ton took pictures. They even had an armored train on display which was a first for me.

The town had a nice square that we spent about 45 minutes exploring. About half way thru Ton proposed lunch. We have discovered the Slovak set lunch of Soup, and a main dish. Today our lunch with the addition of a beer cost only €20 for the two of us.

The second stop was the small village of Spania Dolina. Copper has been mined near the village since 1254, though there is evidence of mining activities around 2000 bc.

The town has a church built on a hill above the main square that served not only as a church, but as a fortification when needed. The church was built of stone, but the spire was wood and was beautiful.

After we visited the church we climbed back down and went to visit the mines. One of the shafts was opened up for about 50 feet and we walked down to see it.

The village is full of pretty stone and wooden roofed houses, and while the permanent residents are now less than 200 there were more homes there than that. We guess that a lot of the homes are vacation homes as the town is now a center for hiking and cross country skiing in the Tatra Mountains.

After Spania Dolina we doubled back about an hour to a place that had good reviews on Park4Night. Every trip we run into a place that is “interesting”. Our campsite tonight is that place. It is behind a large restaurant situated in a newly constructed village of very large and expensive looking homes that we think are for rent, but that is not certain. There are about 20 of these homes, and none of them are occupied. The shower is located in the basement of the restaurant in a weight room. The lady who helped us was very nice though we did not share a common language, so she decided I would understand German better than Slovak and spoke to me in German. Despite that we managed to communicate. No one showed up for dinner either so the kitchen staff all left at 6:30, so as near as I can tell we are the only ones now occupying this huge complex.

Tonight we are camped in the Tatra mountains near the Polish border. It is not the place we planed on being but sometimes things happen.

We had a good time getting here. We have a plan for the rest of Slovakia and the first stop on our itinerary was Trencin. It is a nice little town with a castle overlooking it- like many other towns in Europe.

Trencin was about 90 minutes north of Bratislava on a pretty good freeway. We were rolling along when there was a sign saying to slow down for police. As we got near a rest area the police were directing about 70% of the traffic from the freeway into the rest area. In the rest area another set of police were splitting the incoming traffic into two lines. We were directed into the longer line which we were grateful for as we noticed the cars in the other line were getting searched. We were finally approached by a police officer who asked me “No Alcohol?”. I wanted to reply; not at 10:30 in the morning, but just said no. He then said he was going to have me blow into a breathalyzer. He handed me a bag with a plastic tube in it and told me to open it. I then performed my first breathalyzer test and after blowing for a few seconds he said “You passed” and waived me on my way. Ton and I were wondering how many people fail at 10:30 in the morning.

We again ended up interacting with the police again when we parked in Trencin. I wasn’t sure if our parking place was pay or not, when Ton noticed a barcode on one of the signs. I scanned it with my phone and it redirected me to a parking app to pay for parking. Interestingly I already had the app downloaded on my phone so I must of used it somewhere else in Europe. I bought 4 hours worth of parking and we were on our way just as two parking cops walked up. Just to be safe I showed him the app and he noodled and said good.

Having finished our interactions with Slovakian police we climbed the hill to the castle. It was a nice castle with great views of the surrounding countryside. It also commanded the river that runs thru the valley.

After the castle we walked thru the main square of the castle to the main site Ton wanted to see which was the Spitting Man Fountain. Nix was a local who couldn’t impress a girl until her house caught fire. He then lowered himself into a well and puts out the fire by spitting water from the well onto it. In the story he succeeds in putting out the fire, but dies doing it, and then the girl falls in love with him. In the fountain commemorating the story he is wearing a Top Hat while he is doing the spitting.

While it was bright blue, the high today was only 50 and there was a brisk breeze. So we decided to duck into a coffee shop to warm up. We were the only customers, but had a great time talking to the owner and the barista about coffee and traveling. We ended up ordering a second cup and sitting in there for 45 minutes because we were enjoying the conversation with the two guys so much. But our allotted parking time was coming to an end and we knew they are enforcing it so we were on our way to a planned overnight stop in Zilina about an hour up the road.

After another hour drive we arrived at the campground in Zilina but it looked closed. The gate was open but there was not a soul in sight. I walked around a bit and noticed a sign on the reception saying that if the reception was closed to find a spot and pay in the morning. So we drove in and I found a place to plug in François. But it still didn’t feel right. Just then a couple walked by with a cute dog and I asked them if they knew if the campground was open. We ended up having another nice 15 minute conversation about our travels in Slovakia, before we both remembered my question about whether the campground was open. He said he would call the owner for me, and after a brief conversation it turns out it wasn’t. But he said there was a campground about 10 kilometers away that was definitely open, so we thanked them and were on our way. Slovaks are quickly working their way up our nice and fun people list.

We had a little scare when we arrived at the recommended campground when the reception was closed, and the barrier was down. But there were a few teenagers using the basketball court so there was hope. After a call to the phone number on the reception we were told to just pick a spot and come pay them in the morning, and she opened the gate remotely. So we are settled in for the night with lows forecast in the mid-30’s, so the heater will be running again.

Some days when you travel like we do the day is about chores and not experiences. That is what we expected today, but it ended up being one of the best days of this trip.

The water on our toilet has not worked since we arrived. For readers who are non-RV’ers it is not as big of a problem as it sounds, especially if you use a cassette toilet like we do, but something you do want to get fixed. I have been doing google searches of shops, and sending emails to try to get an appointment at each city we have visited. At each destination we either didn’t get a reply, or we were told they were too busy. I didn’t have much hope when I sent an email before heading to Bratislava, but was pleasantly surprised to get a quick reply saying if we came in on Monday they could do it. So we were up bright and early and made a short run to a family run business. They took us right in offered us a seat and coffee, and an hour later we left with running water in our toilet. The family running the shop were charming we mentioned we had been down into the city the day before and saw the race. They went and got the two employees who had run the race and brought them to meet us. It was a much nicer experience than you usually have in a repair shop. The price was also great.

We decided to head out into the wine country near here and picked the village of Modra as a target. After a short drive we were in the center of Modra and walking down the main street. It is a very small town and as I walked thru it I was thinking that we have driven thru hundreds of small towns like this over the years without stopping.

We noticed several small cafes advertising coffee in the morning and wine in the afternoon. One ally way caught Tons attention, it was lined with tables and there was a worker hanging things on the wall. He greeted us and said come on in this is my winery.

We thanked him and while Ton took a couple of pictures, he and I chatted. Before we knew it he spontaneously gave us a tour of the winery telling us about not only his own wine but some background on the region and grape varietals in Slovakia. He walked us thru his entire facility from the crushing area to the barrel room. It was one of the best wine tours I have ever had. Early on he handed Ton and I glasses and would periodically stop at a tank and pour us a hefty sample while he explained the grape and the technique he used to produce the wine.

At the end of the tour we met an older gentleman and Fedor introduced his father also called Fedor. His father was a professor of enology at the University in Bratislava for decades. He has toured the world studying wine making techniques and varietals, and has even been recognized by the French government for his research. He has written over 30 books. It was a joy to talk to him also. I asked him his favorite wine and he said he loved wine from Uruguay which was a surprise to us as we did not know Uruguay even produced wine.

At the end we asked Fedor for a lunch recommendation and he told us to try the hotel around the corner if we wanted Slovak food. They had 5 lunch specials but the descriptions were only written in Slovak, the waiter brought us the dinner menu which they had in English but we were fascinated by the Slovak meal. I got out google translate and was able to figure out what the dish was made of. When the waiter came back I ordered the chicken dish, and Ton ordered the mushroom dish. The first thing that arrived was a huge tureen of soup made of smoked sausage, potatoes, and shredded dumpling.

This alone would have been a meal and it was delicious. We then received our main courses which were also delicious, and at the end we received a custard desert. We did not expect a three course meal when we sat down, and each of our meals cost €8.50. We were amazed.

A day we had absolutely no expectations for turned into the most memorable of this trip, and one of our most memorable ever. Slovakia is exceeding our expectations because we keep running into friendly amazing people.

We were expecting rain when we got up but to our surprise it was quite nice out. Ton did a quick check and the rain had gotten delayed overnight and was not not expected to hit until around 5 pm.

We had to sort out the logistics of getting into town as today was the National Devin Run which is a big deal in Slovakia. The race starts at a castle about 12 kilometers outside of town and ends in the center of Bratislava. We could tell that the tram route was shortened to accommodate the run but couldn’t tell by how much. The young lady at the front desk determined that the tram ran to the center of the city so we were good to go.

We needed a purpose for the day so walking to the tram we decided to seek out a street sculpture called the sewer worker. It is a cute sculpture showing a guy climbing out of a sewer hole. Ton also had discovered a restaurant that she was interested in trying the food and seeing the building. So with a purpose in mind we struck out into Bratislava.

The main square was packed with post race activities and we stopped and watched a traditional Slovak dance group perform a few songs. Right after the main square we found our first target the sewer hole cover dude. It was a well executed and quirky piece of art that seemed to fit the vibe we felt for Bratislava.

Ton and I have discovered we have a type of city we really enjoy and Bratislava is one of those cities. We admire sophisticated big cities with lots of culture and many things going on like Vienna. But we enjoy cities like Bratislava, and that is different than big and sophisticated.

It is a medium sized city with plenty to do, with people out and about doing things and enjoying themselves. It is more practical than pretentious and people seem to have time to interact with each other. Bratislava has been a great introduction to Slovakia for us and will join a short list of cities that have surprised us.

We had been quick to find the Sewer Worker so we decided we need something else to do before heading to lunch. I suggested we walk across the Danube to the base of the UFO bridge.

It was a nice walk, but the base of the UFO restaurant didn’t offer much, so Ton mentioned the Blue Church. We doubled back across the river to a new part of town and found a beautiful church which is very appropriately called the Blue Church.

There were a few people there, and though it was Sunday you could not enter, but only look thru a locked gate. There was one large tour group who were getting an extended briefing on the church in Spanish.

We had now walked enough to have lunch. The restaurant Ton had picked was located in an old theater that had been converted to a restaurant and brewery. The exterior of the building was nearly swallowed up by a construction zone, but the interior was spectacular. The building has a complicated history. For several hundred years it was a hospital run by an order of priests supported by nuns. Like many church run hospitals they had a side business making beer to help pay for the upkeep of the building. Shortly after the communists took over Bratislava in 1950 the priests and nuns were imprisoned or exiled. The hospital was maintained as a medical clinic but the chapel of the hospital was converted into a theater.

After the communists fell the building was returned to the order of priests. They didn’t know what to do with the theater so they leased it out, and it became the restaurant that exists today. The restaurant also got the right to brew beer using the old formula of the priests. A priest still consecrates the beer periodically. We really enjoyed the meal, the beer, and the atmosphere.

After lunch we hustled back to François just in time to beat the rain. We settled in for a relaxing evening and listened to rain beat on the roof of François.

Slovakia is a country that Ton has been excited about visiting since we began planning this trip. For me it is a bit of a mystery. Our first stop is Bratislava which is the capitol, but is only located about 60 kilometers (as the crow flies) from Vienna. This makes Bratislava and Vienna the two national capitols that are closest to each other.

Bratislava also like Vienna is located on the Danube river, and historically has always been a crossroads of civilizations, at different time in the last 200 years it has been dominated by Hungarian, Austrian Germans, and Slovaks. The population today is more heterogenous than it has been historically with Slovaks making up 86% of the population.

We really needed food so our first stop in Bratislava was a Lidl. After about an hour we were well stocked for the next few days and headed over to our campground.

We were debating whether to take the afternoon off, but a quick check of the weather showed a 65% chance of rain tomorrow. It was beautiful today so we hustled into the city to take advantage of the sunny and warm day.

The tram ride in was thru the commercial and industrial part of town, and it was kind of dead. I was worried that we would not find much to do in the center of town. I was very wrong. The center was bustling with lots of people out enjoying the beautiful weather on a Saturday.

I was enjoying looking at all of the people sitting in cafes with beers and glasses of wine. I was jealous and informed Ton that I wanted a beer. She agreed but I had to first earn it by climbing up to the castle above town.

This was our first hill climb of the trip, it has been nice hanging out in the Netherlands, and even Vienna was surprisingly flat. The climb was pretty steep but in the end it was worth it for the views of the Danube, the city, and the countryside.

Ton rewarded me for our hill climb by allowing me to pick a place to have a beer. I immediately settled on a Black Lager, and Ton had a sampler of local beers. We originally ordered onion rings to snack on, and were disappointed when they arrived in both the quality and quantity, but we noticed an older couple with a bread bowl full of soup. When we asked our waitress about it she explained it was a garlic soup. We ordered it and it was delicious, and when we got the bill we laughed because it cost less than the 8 small onion rings.

As we were eating the fellow at the next table asked why Ton had four different small beers, he had never seen a sampler before. We ended up striking up a conversation and he and his wife were a delight. He was originally from Istanbul and his wife is from Croatia, and they now live in Vienna.

Our late start had us on the streets much later than usual, some of the lights were even coming on so we decided we better head back to François for the evening.