This is the only surviving gate from the city's old wall, and the starting point for the recommended walking tour in our guide book. However, before we begin, we pay the fee for climbing the gate's tower, which is also a museum for old armaments, something of no interest to us, actually, but two euros per person is not an excessive price for climbing the tower. The views are nice; the view of Bratislava Castle is particularly good from this vantage point. Here it is:
We climb back down, but there is yet one more detail before we begin our official walking tour. We walk a bit north to the Grassalkovich Palace, which is the home of the Slovak President. It looks good, but there is no option to go inside.
Back at St. Michael's Gate, we head south through the charming narrow pedestrian streets of the old town. Almost the entire old town, which is a fairly large area, is pedestrian only. Our guidebook directs us to look for a Napolean era cannonball embedded in a wall, but we can't find it. Apparently, Napolean did more damage to Bratislava (then called Pressburg), than what happened in World War II. We emerge in the Old Town Square, which is overwhelmed by a set-up for a road race today. According to the sign, there is a women's relay race at 11am, a children's race at 1pm, and a men's relay race at 3pm. The main square is the endpoint for all of the races. Combined with all of the tour groups here on a Saturday, it is a bit of a zoo. Unfortunately, a good picture of the Old Town Hall is not going to be possible today. Here is the best one I got:
We next pay to enter the city's history museum which is housed in the Old Town Hall, but this is also really just an excuse to climb a tower, this time we will climb the Town Hall tower. We do spend a little time looking at the exhibits, but they are not that interesting. The tower is nice, though: good views of the square and the lovely architecture that surrounds it, many different styles and colors. The colors of the buildings were painstakingly researched when they were restored to try to match the original colors as best as possible.
Another feature of the old town are the amusing statues that can be found. In the square itself, there is a bronze statue of a tired Napolean era French soldier looking tired (in front of the French embassy). Then there is silver statue of a local legend who always dressed up in a top hat and went around calling the girls "pretty." That's a little creepy. Then there is another bronze of a worker climbing out of a manhole. We try to find the statue of a paparazzo, but cannot. Our recommended walking tour then takes us to a larger square, called Hviezdoslav Square, named after a beloved Slovak poet. It is long and wide, with the lovely Slovak National Theater at one end. Just off the main square is another performing space called the Reduta, where the Slovak Philharmonic orchestra performs. It is very Baroque. We stroll doen the square and stop to have lunch at an outdoor cafe called Slang. They have kind of a club sandwich on the menu, which we each enjoyed with a glass of Gruner Veltliner. This square had many nice cafes with outdoor seating areas. Here is a photo of the National Theater:
After lunch, we continue west along the square, passing the US embassy which is a complete eyesore on the square, since they have erected a giant chain link fence around it. Further down, we see a statue of Hans Christian Anderson, who apparently had a nice visit to Bratislava at some point. Then around the corner, there is a Holocaust memorial. This sits at the base to St. Martin's Cathedral, whose most notable feature is a green roofed tower. Neither yesterday nor today are we able to enter, because weddings are happening inside. This is the official end of the guidebook's walking tour. We actually did more walking/roaming the old town yesterday. You can just wander and wander along the cobblestone streets, enjoying the ambience. We will do more walking today, but first: the castle.
We cross under the highway underpass (a big highway leading to Bratislava's UFO bridge separates the old town from the castle), and then we begin our climb up the stairs to the castle. It doesn't take too long, and soon we are enjoying views of the Danube River, the Novy Most (New) Bridge (also called the UFO bridge as noted above) and the Soviet built suburb of Petrzalka. The Soviet era "panel" buildings are fairly uniform, but have been made more attractive in recent years, by painting them in more pleasant colors than gray. Believe it or not, this is apparently a popular place to live for young adults as it is kind of affordable, and the buildings have been upgraded since the Soviet time. There is actually a magazine you can subscribe to in Slovakia that is all about how to decorate/remodel your "panel" apartment. Seeing how many there are (a hundred buildings?), this is probably a popular magazine. Here is the view of the New Bridge we enjoyed with the panel buildings in the background:
The castle is white with four towers on each corner. The local nickname for the castle is "the upside down table." It looks very new with good reason. The original castle, which Empress Maria Theresa remodeled into a royal residence, burned down in 1811. The current castle was a Soviet era reconstruction completed in 1953. Here is a closer view of the castle entrance:
Our guidebook recommends skipping the museum in the interior, so we do. We just enjoy the views. We make our way back to the old town, delayed a little bit as the competitors in the men's race pass us by (including some women -- maybe I read the sign wrong). It is nearly 4pm, and I think we have pretty much seen all that is worth seeing, so we return to the hotel. We'll be back in the old town later for dinner -- lots of walking today. Here is the view of the old town from the castle with St. Martin's cathedral in the foreground:
After a nice rest, we walk back to the old town a little before six. Our dinner reservatione were for 7pm, and we decide it will be nice to sit in the Hvliezdoslav Square and enjoy a glass of wine before dinner, watching the locals stroll by on a beautiful Saturday evening. We stop at the same place where we had lunch. Dinner is at the restaurant Modra Hviezda. The concierge at our hotel made the reservation for us, since we had inquired about a recommendation for a good Slovak restaurant in the old town. This place is not in the town center (no shortage of restaurants there!), but about halfway up the steps to the castle. It is a good choice. It seems like it is built into the castle walls with stone and brick vaulting. We have a lovely waitress who helps us make excellent choices. I start with the vegetable soup, simple but very good, then have beef filet with grilled vegetables and corn -- perfect! Rob starts with smoked trout -- really good, not too fishy, not too smoky -- and then has a pork cutlet butternut squash puree and roasted chestnuts. Rob enjoyed this very much as well. Normally, we do not order dessert, but our waitress insisted, so we got a confection of chocolate and almonds, kind of a flourless cake, also very good. Our wine was a local red (called Alibernet?), that we enjoyed, but was different, almost like a tempranillo?
The entertainment for the evening was an Austrian "hen party," occurring in the next room of the restaurant. I had thought hen parties were mostly a British thing, but I guess they do them all over Europe now. The young women (totalling 14) were all dressed in shades of black and white wearing costume cat ears. The bride-to-be had a sash and of course a cheap veil. Halfway through dinner, our waitress came to us with an unusual request: could we (individually) go into the men's bathroom, take some of the flowers in the vase and then present them to the bride-to-be? We were the only men in the restaurant not accompanied by women. Well, we couldn't say no, so we did as suggested. I don't know why, but we each received an enthusiastic (loud) reception. I went one step further and kissed the bride-to-be on each cheek!
Time to return to the hotel and retire for the night.
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