I somehow managed to make it to Bratislava Airport so on time that I was there to meet Doug even though the plane arrived half an hour early. Go me, right? So yes, for the next few days I had an official travelling companion in tow for all my adventures.
Bratislava is another one of those cities with a bit of a bad rep for no good reason. Okay, the castle is a bit new but the Old Town has some great little back streets and crazy statues. Down one of these we found the Restaurant At The End Of The Galaxy, which even had DON'T PANIC written in large, friendly letters on the back of the menu. Genius. Food was good too, and cheap, probably due to its close proximity to one of the universities. There are also some pleasant green bits with fountains you can paddle in (always a sign of a good park). There's also a zoo, with lions and tigers and bears, oh my! And a Dinopark, which is set out like a zoo except with huge model dinosaurs. There was even a 3D cinema!
We headed out on a couple of day trips whilst based in Bratislava. The first was to Devin Castle - an impressive ruin on a hill, complete with a living history camp. Eastern Europe generally seems to play a lot of Dad Rock in shops and restaurants, which is mostly pretty cool. However, it's always a little disconcerting when you go to use the public loo in a castle in the middle of nowhere... and they're playing Genesis. The second day trip was to Vienna. A beautiful city although the prices were a bit of a shock after Slovakia. On the other hand, I think that's evened up by speaking a language that I have a fighting chance of understanding. We went to the butterfly house (Schmettelinghaus ist KRIEG!) and to a museum to see the Terracotta Army.
Possibly my favourite day was when we got a tram out to the edge of the city, picked up some picnic supplies and joined everyone else in (probably) all Slovakia in sitting by the lake. It's huge; there's jetskiing, windsurfing, peddalos... and an island in the middle. A proper Swallows and Amazons job. It was a good few hundred meters out but entirely swimable (if not duffers, won't drown, right?). Had so much fun exploring. We even hired a peddalo for an hour to explore the further reaches of the lake.
Ah yes, and then there were the rock pubs. The Harley Bar was hidden away down an unlikely looking side road. It was set up like a Mexican Saloon and appeared to only play Aerosmith. The Alligator Pub in town was a gloriously crazy place full of gloriously crazy Slovaks and tourists. And a gloriously crazy DJ. I was impressed that he played Rock n Roll Mercenaries (Meatloaf) and delighted that he played Addicted to Chaos (Megadeth - and the source of the quote at the top of this journal), but quite why he found it necessary to play Youthanasia three times, interspered with bad NIN remixes, I'm not entirely sure. Lots of good Dad Rock there too though, so it was all good.
So yeah, and excellent five days. Cheers for the visit, dude.
