We had a wonderful nights sleep at the castle ruins, and awoke to heavy rain. We wanted to find a canyon walk not far from here, but it turned out to be tricky.

First, we got distracted by a city which had a library. It was pissing down, so we thought it would be a good idea and use the library’s free internet to upload a video. But finding the library was a mission. Mike sent me out in the pouring lane to look. Where the library was supposed to be was a Vietnamese restaurant. Inside a sad old Soviet building were a few shops and a musty odour.

I asked a few people until someone eventually spoke English and told me where the library was. I walked up some metal steps, the sound echo-ing around me like I was in a cold-war prison. On the next floor was an electrical shop, and some really old-fashioned clothes shops. I felt like I’d stepped back in time. The only other place was what looked like an art-gallery. I stepped through the metal detector at the entrance, wondering how safe this place actually was to need them. At the end of the gallery was the library. I asked if they had internet and could we use it. Thankfully the kind lady said yes, so I went back out in the pouring rain to fetch Mike and our laptops.

After uploading the video, the rain stopped and we headed on to find our canyon walk. But when we got to the turn off, it was down a very narrow path with a steep drop. I know Bertie is an adventure van, but we weren’t taking him down there. So we went back to a parking spot we saw earlier with a beautiful view over the mountains, and had a little nap.

Afterwards, we tried to find the canyon walk a different way, but I got distracted by the storks. I’ve been obsessed with these guys. We’ve been seeing them a lot, high up in their giant nests, raising their little families. But now it’s time for the babies to leave the nest, and I really want to see them take their first practice flights. I saw one today, he’d just left the nest and was sitting on a nearby power pole. But he was just sitting there, looking worn out. I keep having little stork conversations in my head. I think there might be a story in it.

Anyway, to get to the canyon walk was impossible, so we gave up and moved on. We were navigating to another UNESCO-listed town, when I decided to take the back roads. I’m not sure this was such a good idea. As we drove through little villages in the middle of nowhere, there were a lot of people just hanging around in the road, drinking, staring, not waving back when we waved. The houses had rubbish lying around and  looked unkempt. It was a different vibe to the rest of Eastern Europe so far where everyone has been friendly, or busy working in the fields. But these people seemed to have nothing to do except stand and stare. I didn’t feel particularly safe driving through these towns, so we might keep to the main roads in future.

We eventually arrived at the unesco city we were heading for. We saw the first campervans we’d seen in weeks, so thought perhaps we were back on the tourist trail. They were from Italy, and there were two couples travelling together. We had a fun chat with them using google translate. Then we went and explored the old-town. One thing we have noticed is the lack of tourists in Slovakia. Elsewhere, a place like this would be crawling with tourists. Maybe they don’t bother to leave Bratislava.

It’s pretty much like any other town in Europe. The basilica was impressive from the outside, but was closed for the day. I think you might have to pay to look around so we probably won’t do that. Then we saw an impressive church up on the hill. It turns out it is also a free place to camp. So off we drove, up the steep and narrow road. There was a beautiful view of the city down below. But the carpark for camping, while nice, didn’t have the vibe for us. As we headed down, we passed the Italians on their way up. It would be the perfect place for them to camp as a group.

We headed back into the city, where we parked in a carpark in town (free parking). We went out for dinner, but it was pretty average food. When we got back to the car park, the Italians were camped next to us again!