A Visit to a Surprise Nation

Yes,  my son and I visited another country on our way back from Bratislava to Krakow.

This time,  however,  it was not planned.

It just kind of happened.

You see,  my son and I had had a marathon few days,  and we were feeling pretty tired.

Happy and feeling lucky,  but definitely tired. Exhausted,  maybe would even be a better word for it.

Budapest still feels a bit like a crazy blur.  So does Vienna. So by way of comparison,  Bratislava was a welcome change of pace.  Small and mostly quiet,  almost sleepy.

After the crazy but awesome trip to Budapest,  we visited Vienna.  Not nearly as thoroughly as we had Budapest,  but there were reasons for that.  First of all,  we were extremely lucky finding free parking right next to the youth hostel that we were staying in at Budapest.  That was a privilege that we did not have in Vienna.  Also,  we were only staying in Vienna for part of the day,  trying to fit in a decent one day trip without the privilege of staying the night, because we had reservations in Bratislava.

So,  we tried to visit as much of Vienna as possible with more limited time and circumstances. With parking in Budapest taken care of,  we could afford to forget about the car.  That was not the case in Vienna,  however.  Yet,  we did get extremely lucky in terms of parking in Vienna.  It was free everywhere that we went,  both by circumstances and sheer luck.  In District 1, the major tourism sector of the city,  parking is apparently free on weekends. Needless to say, we were pleasantly surprised. Then,  we just got very lucky parking close to other major tourist sites, finding parking spaces that were available and free.  Not sure that I could even repeat that feat if I tried, truth be told.

By the end of the day,  however,  we were both tired from all of the chaos from running around two major cities. So tiny Bratislava,  with it's quiet, relaxed pace,  was a welcome respite from the chaos of Budapest and Vienna.  It was what we needed.

We disciplined ourselves enough to go see the old town at night,  and briefly visited again on Sunday morning.

That was when we left and headed for Krakow.

According to Google maps,  the trip was scheduled for four and a half hours.

That was no surprise.

What did surprise me was when we suddenly entered the Czech Republic.

To be honest,  I was beginning to suspect as much,  when we kept seeing signs for Brno.

82 My reaction was mixed. I love traveling and seeing new things.  But I also wanted to get a vignette,  and that turned out to be a more tedious process than I would have believed possible.

Elsewhere, I wrote a little bit more about my experiences with the vignette.

Suffice to say,  we got the vignette,  and continued on into the Czech Republic.

Pictures (more of them, anyway) are posted on another,  somewhat similar blog entry about our surprise visit to the Czech Republic.

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