Bratislava

I am sitting in a quirky hotel in Sighisoara, Transylvania, listening to the rain outside. We have been blessed with great weather for most of our trip so far, but today, we woke up to gloom and rain. Well, well, you can’t have it all.

Last post left us in Cracow. From there, we took a bumpy night train to Bratislava (Slovakia), arriving one hour delayed, just before seven in the morning. Walking through a new city early in the morning is a special sensation. There was some nice light early on, then the sky turned cloudy. We strolled through the old city and ran into a Swedish woman who taught Swedish at the university. Had breakfast at a café and then climbed the hill up to the castle. Which was under renovation and closed, but the views were still good. Bratislava seems to be a pleasant enough city, but there are not many attractions. One of them is a funky bridge over the Danube with an UFO stuck in the top end of the pylons, kind off.

By chance, we ran into a dilapatated Art Noveau Palace with lots of beautiful details. Next to it, a newly built or newly renovated very blue church had the looks of the architect from Barcelona, don't remember his name. That, maybe combined with a bit of Art Noveau. It looked like something some doper in the red light district might see after eating to many magic mushrooms.

Justin and Liz, the two Australian architects I met in Dubrovnik and later in Amsterdam, saw on Facebook that I was on my way to Bratislava, so they came over for the day from Vienna! We met them for lunch in a cosy old-style restaurant (The Slovak Pub) full of students, where we had Slovakian food and beer. Then strolled some more and later had a fika and even later dinner in a vaulted bar/restaurant (called KGB).