Wednesday December 7th, the fifth day of our Christmas market tour, was mostly taken up with travel. We again rode by bus. This time riding with a private bus company called RegioJet. The 5 hour trek from Prague to Vienna was very nice considering it was the cheapest ticket on our whole trip. As our bus rolled along there was an attendant who walked up and down the aisle offering free coffee, and trying to sell snacks. Another perk was a monitor for every seat that allowed you to play games, watch movies, or listen to music.
The scenery was mostly unremarkable views of flat farm fields in the Czech Republic. When we crossed into Austria the only difference was the constant sight of electricity generating windmills on the horizon. Our bus made just one quick stop along the way, in the town of Brno, which seemed like a stereotypical Eastern European city—in a bad way. What stuck with me as we drove through Brno was how boring and uniform all of the Soviet era buildings were.
At 3:30 p.m. we pulled into Vienna. We then easily navigated the subway system to bring us to the apartment that would be our home base for the next four nights. At this apartment the rental company gave us the key at the door. The apartment felt quite spacious with two stories, two balconies, and two bathrooms. However, it only had two beds, so my mother slept on the couch, but she said it was comfortable.
After settling in we picked up some groceries, then we went out for a short walk to a Christmas market. Just a couple blocks from our apartment was a busy market in front of a church called Karlskirche. This Christmas market felt like it was run by hipsters. There were performance artists on stills dressed up as fairies, a small merry-go-round powered by bicycles, and lots of artsy stuff for sale at the booths. Still it was a fun experience. We ate bratwurst pizzas, marveled at the views of the grand church, then eventually called it a night. On the schedule for the next day was a short day trip to Bratislava…
Before bed on Wednesday night we arranged to meet Sandy Zwanzinger at the Vienna train station Thursday morning. Sandy was a foreign exchange student with Janell in 2009, and she currently lives in Vienna. On Thursday morning we met up with her a little after 9:45 a.m., then bought 10:15 a.m. train tickets for the hour long ride to Bratislava.
It was a cold and foggy day that didn’t give us much for views out the train window. Our group of five couldn’t all sit together on the train, but it worked out ok, because my mom and I sat together next to a native Slovakian who was open to talking with us. He didn’t have a lot of good things to say about Bratislava, and instead thought his hometown, which had an old castle, and which I forgot the name of, was a better place to experience Slovak culture.
After exiting our train in the capital city of Slovakia we made a small mistake by boarding the wrong bus. We got off and found a passerby to ask for directions and they strangely were able to speak German but not English. Good thing Sandy was with us! Once on the correct tram, it was only a few minutes ride into the old town, where all of Bratislava’s tourist sights are close together.
We first walked passed the ornate Primate’s Palace, seat of the Mayor, then we came to the main square. We were greeted with the festive atmosphere of the city’s Christmas market, as well as the sweet smell of fried food. The first booth we came to on the edge of the square was selling an interesting sandwich packed with deep fried cheese, and deep fried meat. It didn’t look very healthy, but I still bought one, and it was very delicious.
After a quick walk past some Christmas market booths, we continued our sightseeing by heading over to the city’s main church named, St. Martin’s Cathedral. Unfortunately we couldn’t enter because of an ongoing mass, but as we were checking it out from the outside we noticed another of Bratislava’s landmarks, The UFO restaurant. This restaurant shaped like a UFO is perched 85m above the ground just across the Danube river from old town Bratislava. We were content with just seeing the restaurant, and next resumed our sightseeing by walking up to Bratislava castle.
The castle, located on the top of a small hill just outside of the old town, is mostly the work of restoration that started in 1957. Before that the castle was in ruins from an 1811 attack during the Napoleonic Wars. And before that humans were always doing something on the hill with the oldest traces of humans activity going all the way back to 3500 B.C. We decided to skip the castle tour, and instead wandered around its grounds and gardens. From the edge of the fortified hill we spent some time admiring the expansive view down to the fog shrouded city.
Once we walked down the castle hill and made it back to the cathedral enough time had passed that it was open to the public again. Of note in the cathedral was a large statue of St. Martin (the namesake of the cathedral) that looks like he’s going to either have his horse step on someone or hit the person with his sword. However, the statues description says it depicts him giving the person his coat. Also in the cathedral was a morbid section of glass bottom floor that looked down into a crypt, complete with visible human bones.
After the cathedral our sightseeing took us to Michael’s gate, Bratislava’s only remaining city gate. Built about 1300 A.D. it is one of the oldest structures in Bratislava, and the only remaining gate from Bratislava’s time as a walled city. We stayed long enough to take a couple pictures then we hurried back to the Christmas market in the main square.
After warming up with some Gluhwein, buying some snacks, and doing a little shopping, we only had one tourist sight left to see: The Bratislava City museum. This museum, which is located in the old town hall, is filled with all sorts of artifacts and information telling the history of Bratislava. We first walked through displays of religious artifacts, then began climbing the town hall tower. At the top of the tower we had a great view of the old town, and the main square directly below us from a 360 degree, outdoor balcony.
The museum then continued by taking us through the middle ages when Bratislava was briefly the capital of Hungary, the 1700 and 1800’s when it was filled with Germans who named the city Pressburg, and all the way up to the communist era. The last part of the museum was the basement where various torture instruments are displayed. It’s a sobering section of the museum, and shocking to imagine that most of the items on display were actually used.
We then left the museum and found the sky quickly darkening with the setting sun. Our tour of Bratislava had covered all the highlights, so we made our way back to the train station, and from there back to Vienna. We picked up a couple pizzas on our walk back to the apartment, then we went to bed early to rest up for our next day in Budapest…
