Bratislava in the capital of....
It all started off innocently enough, but it turned into an amazing day of excitement and adventure, fear and complete and total ignorance. (on my part). We were in Vienna, we wanted to get out of the city for the day and seexplore the surrounding area. It was only once we got to the train station that Amber casually mentioned that we were in fact, going to a completely different country, that I started to panic - nothing a quick massaging chair wouldn't fix...
"Who? What? Where? When? How?" were the first questions that popped into my head as I sat still. "Us", going to a different country by train and "now" were the easy answers - it was just the "where" that I struggling with. "What country is it in?" "What language do they speak?" "What currency do they use?" "Do I need my passport?" were the slightly harder ones but it seemed that Amber was keen for a true adventure, so off we set...
After my "lost in France" fiasco, I have made it a new rule to always have a contact who speaks the language in whatever city I am in on standby. Seeing as I still didn't quite know what city I was in, I settled on my Polish friend Kasia. Feeling confident with a foreign language speaker on standby, we got a map of the city and set to explore...
Amber is what some might call a "dedicated" tourist - once she gets to a new city, she wants to see everything and won't take "no" for an answer. I learnt this fascinating insight the hard way once we spotted the Bratislavian equivalent of Buckingham Palace....Amber decided she wanted to take a look (despite the fact that the very big gates weren't that inviting...)
The armed guards also didn't put her off...and she just wondered straight in. I followed her and shared her embarrassment as we were turned away...
Trying to keep Amber in line, I felt that a walking tour was the safest option. We were the only two people on it so got a really unique insight into the city through the eyes of a lovely local lady whose name I've completely forgotten...
We decided to take our travelling just that one step further with a bus trip to a castle. I really wasn't sure about this, but I went along with it anyway. We saw some lovely things on our trip out there...
had a slightly scary encounter with a snake...
and finally we spotted it....but where was the entrance?
we finally tracekd it down and discovered that it was closed !! That didn't stop the dedicated sight-seeing Amber who boldly walked up the front gate and was refused entry to her second Bratislavian tourist attraction...
We spent our last (insert Bratislavian currency) on some cheap booze as a present for Kristin for being such a great host...
Oh & Bratislava is the capital of Croatia, just in case you hadn't worked it out...
posted by Sue @ 3:58 pm
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We had a lovely dinner out in Clapham...
I tried a local delicacy (what we would call "a hot chocolate") and who says I'm not experimental with food !
Whilst we were sitting there, I was watching this very hard working woman clean the windows of the building opposite.
Her attention to detail was outstanding - she was there for HOURS !! And I kept worrying that she might fall out of the window, but turned out she was a true professional...
The big ferris wheel...
