Tips on Slovakia
 

Any additional tips on Slovakia? I had planned to skip Poprad, but will take a look at Stary Smokovec. Our party will consist of me, my wife, a 4 year old and and 11 month old. We'll rent a car upon leaving Bratislava.

I apologize for any misspellings. I do not have my notes or book with me and I'm not keen to look everything up right now.

Our current plan is:
2 nights in Bratislava - Modra on the way to our next stop
1 in Bansky Stiavnica
2 in the Terchova/Vratna Valley area to coincide with Janosik Days
1 in Zuberec, having visited Orava Castle
2 in Grand Castle near Liptov, visiting Aqua Park Tatralandia
2 in Levoca (a visit to Spis Castle)
1 in Bardejov

We may or may not spend one night in Kosice. We are heading to Split afterward and I think I would rather spend two nights there than one there and one in Kosice, but the transportation options make a night in Kosice make sense.

Hi alamedaguy,

As we have a policy of not resurrecting threads older than a couple of years (to avoid confusion with out-of-date information), I've split your post out into a new thread. I hope you can get the information you need here.

stut
Co-Moderator
Europe Forum

Great, thanks!

I'll add that we're traveling in July and August.

Sounds like a nice trip, if not a lot of moving around.

Bratislava
 

Having spent a day and night in Bratislava last week, I can offer a limited observation. I felt that one day was more than enough to see the major sites. The castle is closed, but the exterior is accessible. The downtown area is small and compact worth a couple of hours wander. It is worth it to visit the multi-lingual Tourist office downtown. They are very helpful.

Streets are cobblestone for the most part so schleping the kids may be a factor for you. I stayed at the Sheraton for cash and points which was an ok deal (regular rates are not) It is new hotel attached to a mall.

Taxis are problematic in this city. They want at least $US15 as a minimum from the railroad station or airport. Railway station to Sheraton is 5km. Airport is approximately 20 minutes. Taxi drivers seem to prefer to stand around rather than have a fare for a reasonable price. Meters are available in limited zones.

Downtown is so small that walking is the preferred method.

Despite not driving, the traffic conditions were what one would find in any European country (Italy and Romania excepted). I did take a van from the Bratislava airport to Vienna airport when our flight was cancelled. Note: there are limited flights into Bratislava. In fact only two Czech air flights daily, nine hours apart from Prague. The major carrier is Ryan Air.
One option, if rental rules will allow, is to fly into Vienna and rent there (although Austrian rates are normally very expensive).

Since you plan to drive, I suggest that you check out Auto Europe for cars and to determine if one can take a rental from Slovakia to Split. It is a beautiful drive along the Adriatic coast from Croatia to Split but it will take a couple of days or more. They can also inform you if there are drop off fees within Slovakia should you decide not to drive all the way to Split.

Thanks, opushomes and adventureadam. Yes, we will be a little rushed, but I'm hoping things will be okay.

We are flying into Vienna then planning to take the boat to Bratislava. Unfortunately, the drop fees on the cars are huge - I think $500 or more to Croatia. Additionally, the agencies who would even offer that already had higher daily rates. I will check with Auto Europe.

We're staying at the Sheraton, as well.

I get over to Slovakia every other year or so to visit cousins and I agree completely with opushomes about Bratislava. It's a great city to visit, but you can complete most of the things to do there in a day or day and a half. I enjoy just walking the city and the parks and gardens are quite beautiful. If you are spending more than a day, try to get to the Botanical Gardens.

If you are thinking of taking the Hydrofoil from Vienna, be sure to get your reservations early. It's a pretty popular trip and was sold out several days before we wanted to take it from Vienna to Bratislava several years ago in late September or early October. The train isn't a bad trip, but getting from the train station to anywhere near the tourist areas can be a challenge.

Kosice is another city that you can see pretty much in one day, but I still love visiting since the people are quite friendly and the food is good. There are several restaurants on the main street in the historical center and always seem to have quite a few people having dinner. The prices are also reasonable. I generally end up at one which I like (I think it's called Restaurant 12 apostolov).

One tip from my cousins... If you are driving through Slovakia, don't speed. The police give tickets for 1 mile over the speed limit and will expect you to pay immediately if you are a foreigner...

Enjoy your trip... It's a beautiful country and the people are great.

Note that, if you get the train from Vienna to Bratislava, you have two options: a spangly new double-decker train to Bratislava-Petrzalka, or a clattering old railcar to Bratislava-Hlavni.

I would always opt for the latter. Bratislava Hl St (main station) is close to the centre of town, with a good tram service towards the old town. Petrzalka is miles away. There is a bus service from there, though, but the taxis have outrageous fares.

A little to add to this post. When I rode the train to HL Station last week it was not a clattering old railcar. It was an OBB single level commuter with clean and well maintained coaches pulled by a diesel Lok. Both destinations depart from Ost Bahnhof which can be somewhat difficult to find since most schedules say the trains leave from Sud Bahnhof nearby and under reconstruction. If one is coming from Kartner Ring (Le Meridien for example) the easiest way is to take the "D" tram to the end of the line which is about a 100 meter walk to the funky Ost Bahnhof. One can buy tickets, coffee and pastries in the station.

An interesting offer is the 14 euro 4 day RT which includes the first day of unlimited Bratislava local transport. Trams and Buses. The normal one way ticket is 21.40 euro. Hint: just do not use the return.

The HL station has no redeeming social value. There is no information booth, just a dingy waiting area where the Slovakian railways tell you rudely to go away if you ask for information.

Please note that the #13 tram goes within an easy walk of the Sheraton. To reach the tram, one must descend a set of steps located to the left side of the station as one faces the taxi rank. They, like the station are somewhat dingy. They also are fairly steep. Ask the driver for the stop near the Sheraton Hotel.

Once you reach the little park near where the tram stops, proceed back in the direction from which the tram came. Once you reach the main street, turn left and look for a street that obliquely goes to the right. One will also see a number of modern buildings which are the mall and the Sheraton. If you inadvertently miss the main street and end up on the river bank, just turn left and follow the paved pathways to the Mall. The Sheraton is to the right of the mall, but there is no direct connection.

There is a bookstore on the bottom level of the mall which should have copies of Slovakian road maps.

http://i732.photobucket.com/albums/w...atislava-1.jpg

This is the actual ticket for this route.

Ah, glad it's been upgraded!

When I first used to do the route, you had to change on the border (no station, just the tracks) from a fairly old Austrian railcar to an antediluvian Slovakian one.

Being the anorak that I am, I really enjoyed it :)

taxis in Bratislava
 

Hi,

ad taxi : if you preorder the taxi (latest cca 10mins before departure) then you will get about 50% reduction vs flagging on the street.
A pricelist for my favorite taxi company here : http://www.hellotaxi.sk/en/cennik.php?odkial=N&kam=4

Actually, according to law, they should always use use meters. So you should not board taxi if driver refuse to use it.

I was just in Bratislava at the new Kempinski Hotel River Park.

Prior to this visit, I had only spent a few hours in the city so I missed out on quite a bit (had I known of the cool marzipan shop/museum in the old town i probably would´ve gone back just for that).

The Kempinski is a great hotel - I wrote up a review with lots of photos and it´s available online here.

In the meantime, this might be helpful as an intro to the city: What´s Doing in Bratislava

A few random things I remember from the trip:

First, Slovakia was awesome. We did the itinerary basically as I posted it without the night in Bardejov at the end. We also did not make it to Kosice. Each place we visited was great and I would recommend them all. Starting in Banska Stiavnica, we primarily stayed in and ate at penzions. They almost always had things for kids to do, ranging from a basket of toys to playgrounds and trampolines.

Janosik Days in Terchova were a particular highlight. It was like a small carnival or fair with tons of great folk performances. We could hardly get our four year old away from the performances until we promised her she could ride a couple of the death traps.

We visited both Orava and Spis Castles and they were both excellent. The tour at Orava was tough because it was in Slovak and quite long. I'm not sure whether they have English tours available but we basically showed up for the last tour of the day and there wasn't much flexibility. Spis had English language listening devices so we got to go at our own pace.

My German served us well in many places, but enough people spoke English that we would have survived.

My wife particularly enjoyed trying many different versions of halusky. She makes a dish at home we call halusky with just noodles and cabbage. Since she is vegetarian, I doubt she'll change her recipe, but she happily ordered it and picked out the bacon all over the country.

Most of our hotels came from Lonely Planet. Some were particularly welcoming or well situated and I'll list them.

Banska Stiavnica - Penzion Prijemny Oddych
Terchova (really in Stefanova) - Chata Vratna
Levoca - Oaza - a tremendous bargain and quite nice

We had booked hydrofoil tickets from Vienna but when we got to the launch we found out the Danube was partially closed to pull at a sunken boat. We ended up taking the bus, which worked out fine. It dropped us off very near where the hydrofoil would have. We walked to the Sheraton. It was a long walk given that we had a 4 year old, an 11 month old, a lot of luggage and a carseat, but ordinarily it would be fine.

EDIT: Ooops, I posted little too late :D maybe it's gonna help someone else :)

If you choose to travel to Vienna by train, don't forget that you can add public transportation in Vienna for one day to your ticket for just 3,60 EUR. Also, your ticket would be valid for both routes - to Hlavna stanica and Petrzalka. You can choose to travel outbound from Hlavna stanica and return to Petrzalka, if you'd like.

If you'd like to eat close to Danube, I'd definitely go for some restaurant in Eurovea mall - they are all located on embankment and most of them is good quality. Alternatively, I like restaurant Ako doma which is nice, have really good food, mostly good staff and nice prices. But it's located little out of hand.

I wouldn't use taxis unless absolutely necessary. They will try to overcharge you and don't deserve your business. Buses run round the clock, 365 days a year*. Special fare is payable on night services, but if you have 24 hours ticket (or ticket with longer validity), you'll be fine. You can't buy ticket in bus on any intra-city service.

(* well, there is exception, we don't have bus services for 2 hours a year - that's 2:30-3:30 on Christmas day and one hour when we switch to winter time, I guess that won't affect you :))