Bratislava breeze through

Bratislava's Old town


Bratislava
12th June
We arrived in Bratislava after a fairly long bus trip ('no more bus trips' - Nick) with no where to stay so we hit the first wifi cafe we found, ordered a cheap coffee so the internet was free and checked out the options online. We found a hostel near by with free beds but Bratislava has the Euro so it wasn't that cheap really... It was one of those massive mass-produced hostels with lots of facilities but no 'vibe'.
We'd only planned to stay in Bratislava for one night so we headed over to the train station to book our train to Hungary, got on the wrong tram coming back and promptly got lost without a map or english speaking person anywhere to be found. Nick wanted to wander around for hours getting more and more lost but I said we should just catch the tram back to the train station and start again. He wasn't happy but we did that and made it back to the hostel eventually. It was also freezing, despite the sun being out making the urgency to get back to the hostel even more urgent!
Once that was over we headed out straight away to see the old town. It was kind of a let down... it was pretty but very contrived compared to the rest of Bratislava, you felt like you were at an American theme park. I preferred the dirty part of Bratislava, just down the road from the old town, it reminded me of Sydney :) Its like these old communist countries have to have a token 'old town' to be allowed into the EU. If there isn't something touristy to look at... denied. Another thing all these old communist cities have is massive apartment blocks... cold, grey, boulders that encircle the cities like sentinels. Its a given, they all have them, no exceptions!
We had dinner in a little restaurant in the seedy part of town, we ordered relatively cheap meals- about 5 euros, but when they came out they were MASSIVE... we pretty much swapped meals cos Nick decided he didn't like his Pizza and I didn't mind and then we struggled through.



Old guy playing music in the old town...


A long way from home

The UFO Bridge

13th June
Our train to Hungary wasn't until the afternoon so we headed out to get some brunch (from Tesco- nothing spesh) and walked up to Bratislava castle. The castle itself didn't really even warrant a photo, but there were nice views of the city below and we chilled out in the park for an hour or so, snoozing and enjoying the sun until it was time to pick up our bags and head to the train station.

next stop... Budapest baby!

At Bratislava castle, trying again for the 'good view behind the head' shot.
The old town from above

The man at work... Bratislava's most photographed site (thats Nick in the pink)