Karyn's Day: ViennaFiveBratislava

Visited another country today...Slovakia. The capital, Bratislava, is an hour's train ride from Vienna. We train hopped to get to the international station in the south of Vienna, bought our tickets at the machines and easily found a seat on the train that was waiting at the platform. The journey took as through flat agricultural land, past many generating windmills just dotted amongst the countryside and over the Danube.

Arriving at the older station we followed the crowd to walk 20 mins or so to the historic part of town. Not quite there yet and looking for a coffee we decided to encroach upon the services of the Crowne Plaza, enjoying coffee and cake and assessing our day's options.

While looking at the map we noticed an ad for the "Metal Shop." A whole shop devoted to the heavy metal music genre! Deciding that we needed to go there as proxy for our son Gary, that was our first port of call. Entering the modern shop, the background music was immediately familiar. No doubt the young staff were slightly bemused by our interest but they were friendly and helpful. We spent half an hour wandering, mentioning that our son was a member of a band with an album. One of the girls went to the computer and we were able to bring up the album on U Tube. Hopefully she will spread the word!!!

The shop was halfway up the hill to the landmark red-roofed castle of this town so we kept walking up. Great views but decided to forgo another castle visit. Wandered back through the park and into the old town precinct. There was a noticeable lack of crowds. Hooray! Historical facts were written on billboards so we were getting a picture of the history. Reaching the centre square I noticed a tourist train. Let's get on. The one-carriage train took us around the small cobbled streets pointing out all of the former palaces of the Austro-Hungarian aristocracy and relating that Locksmiths needed to be reputable and of good-moral character. So the Roberts' are carrying on the tradition.

A little hungry by now, we bought a cone of buttered baked potato from a street seller and listened to a folk group playing an assortment of very basic instruments.

Caught a taxi back to the station and eventually arrived back around 6.15 to cook up the remaining goodies in our fridge.

Although Bratislava has areas of tiredness about it, it does have a modern bus and tram system. Of course Vienna' s system is also wonderful. These infrastructures have emphasised to us that despite the cost and inconveniences at the moment, the current projects happening in Melbourne are vital for ease of movement in the future. Should have been started years ago.