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Day 2 Budapest to Bratislava

Hi all,
Yesterday we cruised off from Budapest to travel overnight to our new stop here at Bratislava. The boat ride is very smooth and quite. It is really cool watching the scenes go by as we travel under a bridge, see another church etc.

Bratislava (Slovakia) is another of the countries that has undergone some troubles in the past similar to Budapest. The Ottomans, the Germans and then the Soviets. They are sure glad that they now have democracy and are recovering their economy.  It is divided into 2 sections the Old Town on one side of the river and the new town (with soviet concrete jungles on the other).




We mainly toured around the old town looking at the history and the all the statues and monuments. The old town had a fortified wall around it to keep out the Turks, and then was taken down only 1 of the 4 gates remain where the kings etc entered the city.

Check out the old gates

Here are some famous statues see if you can guess before reading the names.
a famous poet?? Don't know him

To commemorate the Holocaust

St George and the dragon


Man at work (very famous here) He is in a manhole
Hans Christian Andersen
Notice both have a shiny part? Like the dog in Scotland suppose to be lucky to rub those parts.

After our walk we ventured into the Christmas markets. Yep that is what this cruise is all about. We tasted some local wine concoction plenty of % alcohol, some Ghost cakes and again bought a few more Christmas souvenirs.


Ghost cakes

Popular hanging scented decorations

After lunch they took us about 40 mins out of the city to a small village of about 5,000 where we had afternoon tea with a local family. That was really good. We had an interpreter translate as the lady told us about the history, her family and answered our questions. A special visit we have to say. They own a large house and grow their own grapes and make 1000 L of wine each year, both Rose and Riesling. We also tasted some homemade lemonade made from Elderflowers. Lovely taste as well.
200 yr old house


Vineyards across the road at the main house

Local Folk art pottery

Notice the pool directly below the table 1 level down - see through

The old house is owned by them and is 200 years old and was lived up until 40 years ago.
Trams and trolley buses here

Bratislava coat of arms


Another interesting and great day.

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