Ahhh... strudel, goulash and good, cheap red wine! We only had 4 nights in Slovakia in the Tatra Mountains, but almost as soon as our train crossed the border from Hungary into Slovakia, we had a feeling we were going to love it.
We stayed in a lovely log cabin/mountain refuge which was more like a hotel, and were fed with wonderful homely Slovakian food each night after our day of hiking (dumplings, stew, goulash, and some strange national dish of dumplings and sheeps cheese that was rather reminiscent of school-dinner macaroni cheese).
The mountains are spectacular, somewhat similar to the Swiss alps. On one hike we foolishly made up our own route only to discover late in the hike that we would be going the wrong way along a one way path ?? We'd never come across a one way walking path before but we're glad we turned back anyway, as we were later informed by some other english hikers that we would have ended up trying to climb down a steep 1km roped section with many other hikers coming up. Gary will now be paying more attention to arrows on maps from now on !!
On another day we went out to Spis Castle which is one of the most intact, large medieval castles in Europe. It was filled with a rather weird collection of iron sculptures of sheep and mythical animals that did not quite fit with the period, but the castle was impressive nontheless.
p.s. One of the marvels about European travel is crossing borders whilst never having to show your passport... fantastic - makes a nice change from the usual border interrogations we are subjected to in certain countries.
About Us
- Caroline and Gary
- We are taking a year out of our regular lives in 2008 to fulfil a long held dream to travel around the world. We plan to visit some of the most beautiful mountainous and far flung places on earth, and learn about different cultures