It is only a 2.5 hour train ride from Ostrava to Bratislava, Slovakia. Jill and I went there for 24 hours. My first surprise was that the language was so similar that I had no trouble reading signs, menus, basic information. I knew Czech and Slovak were similar, but it was more so than I’d expected.
As per every single Central European city (as far as I can tell), Bratislava has a castle on a hill overlooking the city – and castle ruins. Best if you have both, though smaller villages seem to have only one or the other, poor things.
The historical district was quite beautiful – cobblestone streets, colorful, ornate buildings. An ancient gate. The food options were good as well. We had a phenomenal meal at the Green Buddha Saturday night.
St. Martin’s cathedral was still decked out in Christmas trees despite the fact that it is near the end of January. I’m always taken with the stunning and audacious beauty and wealth of churches. It’s both disgusting (selfish hoarding of wealth, garish) and breathtakingly gorgeous.
But I’d never seen a church like the Blue Church of St. Elizabeth, sometimes called the Marshmallow Church. And I can see why. We got there after dark, but even in dim light, it was fascinatingly different from any other church I’ve seen so far.
But the highlight of my trip was the Devin castle ruins that are something like a thousand years old. It was insanely cold and windy and we had to take a bus and then walk through town to get to it, but it was well worth it.
What I cannot wrap my head around is that you’ll see, as in the first photo above, a pub, restaurant, small parking lot, and then, oh yeah, ancient castle ruins in the background. Because that’s just normal. Coming from a country where no architecture is older than 250 years, it remains mind-boggling to me.
I don’t think we needed more than a day here, but I’m glad we went. I’m also glad to be out of the wind and cold.
Adventures in the Czech Republic 
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