Bratislava, Slovakia

When I visited Vienna, the captital of Austria, I also planned a day trip to Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia, which is located just an hour by train from Vienna Hauptbahnhof, Vienna’s Central Station. Slovakia is located in the heart of Central Europe, bordering the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Hungary to the south, and Ukraine to the east. Slovakia is often confused with Slovenia, which the inhabitants of both countries don’t quite appreciate, but perhaps is to be blamed partly on the Slovaks, who call their own country Slovensko, which is at least somewhat confusing.

The area that is now Slovakia became part of the Habsburg Empire in the eleventh century, and Bratislava was the capital of the Habsburg Empire for three hundred years (until 1783). In 1867, Bratislava became part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. During the First World War, the Czechs and Slovaks sided with Russia, thus breaking with Austria-Hungary. After that war, the dual state of Czechoslovakia was formed. After World War II (during which the Nazis divided Czechoslovakia), the country fell under the influence of the Soviet Union and lay on the eastern side of the Iron Curtain. In 1989, the communist regimes in Eastern Europe collapsed, marking the beginning of the end for Czechoslovakia. In 1992, Slovakia declared independence, a step that was achieved without violence and is therefore known as the Velvet Divorce. In 2004, the country joined the European Union.

Bratislava is located in the far west of the country, like Vienna, on the Danube River, near the border with Austria. The city has approximately 500,000 inhabitants and has a compact center: Stare Mesto (Old Town), located on the north bank of the Danube. All of Stare Mesto is a pedestrian zone.

It’s sunny and warm (around 27 degrees Celsius) when I arrive in Bratislava. The first eye-catcher immediately ehm… catches my eye: Bratislavský Hrad (Bratislava Castle) towers over Stare Mesto atop an 85-meter-high hill on the Danube River. The castle was built in 1430 by King Sigismund of Luxembourg. The defensive walls are reportedly up to eleven meters thick, and in the seventeenth century, four towers were added at the castle’s corners. In 1811, the castle was largely destroyed by fire and wasn’t restored until the mid-twentieth century.

At the foot of Bratislava Castle stands St. Martin’s Cathedral, built between 1311 and 1452. When Bratislava was the capital of the Hungarian Empire, the Hungarian kings were crowned here. For this reason, a golden crown adorns the top of the 85-meter-high tower. A thoroughfare runs past the cathedral to a bridge known as Most SNP, which stands for Bridge of the Slovak National Uprising. Most SNP is a modern bridge over the Danube, topped by a viewing platform and restaurant shaped like a flying saucer.

I walk down Hviezdoslavono Némestie, a wide pedestrian boulevard that ends at the square of the same name, marked by the Slovak National Theatre, built in 1884-86. In front of the theatre stands the Ganymede Fountain from 1888. Then I walk towards the river. On the corner of the eighteenth-century square Námestie L’udovita Stúra stands the 1870s Esterházy Palace, which has housed the Slovak National Gallery since the 1950s. From the boulevard, you have a beautiful view of the Danube, with the Most SNP on the right and the Stari Most, the old bridge, built in 1889, on the left. After renovations, the bridge reopened in 2015, but only for pedestrians, cyclists, and trams.

I continue past the Blue Church, officially called the Church of Saint Elizabeth, named after the daughter of the Hungarian King Endre II, who was born in Bratislava in 1207. The only reason I pass by here is that it’s a somewhat unusual church, built in the Art Nouveau style, also known as Jugedstil, in the first decade of the twentieth century, with plasterwork and tiles in various shades of blue.

Stare Mesto is home to several eighteenth- and nineteenth-century palaces, including the Primaciálny palác (Primacial Palace). This city palace was built between 1778 and 1781 for Archbishop József Batthyány and is now the seat of the Mayor of Bratislava.

Next, I walk to Hlavné Námestie, Bratislava’s “main square,” according to the signs. The square has existed since the thirteenth century and has been used for everything from celebrations and markets to executions. In the square stands the so-called Roland Fountain, with a statue of Maximilian II, the first Hungarian king to be crowned in Bratislava. Not far from Maximilian stands a more modern statue of Napoleon’s soldier leaning on a bench (elsewhere in the city, you’ll find other modern statues, including two skateboarding girls and a man crawling out of a well in the street). On the east side of Hlavné Námestie stands the Old Town Hall, Bratislava’s former city hall. It consists of several existing houses and a sand-colored clock tower, which were assembled in the fourteenth century.

Via the bustling and touristy Michalská Street, I arrive at Michalská Brána (Michael’s Gate), built in the fourteenth century and the only one of Bratislava’s medieval city gates still standing. Just outside Stare Mesto stands the Main Post Office Building. Built in 1908, it boasts an Art Nouveau glass dome interior. The building still serves as Bratislava’s post office.

A short walk north is Grassalkovich Palace, a white-plastered Baroque palace built between 1760 and 1765, and now the residence of the President of Slovakia. A little further on is Námestie Slobody, a seventeenth-century square that bears no resemblance to an old square. The square, in its current form, was constructed in 1980 and is surrounded by Soviet architecture from the 1970s and 1980s. In the center stands a fountain with a work of art in the shape of a large metal flower. The square is named after the Velvet Revolution of 1989, which heralded the end of communist regimes in Eastern Europe.

A little further north stands perhaps Bratislava’s strangest building: the Slovak Radio Inverted Pyramid, a brown building in the shape of an inverted pyramid, built between 1971 and 1983.You can decide for yourself if you whether you like it or not.

Towards the end of the afternoon, I take the train back to Vienna, my suspicion confirmed that Bratislava is a nice day trip if you’re in Vienna.