A Few Hours in Slovakia

November 03, 2026

A Few Hours in Slovakia

I agreed to go to Vienna with the caveat of doing a day trip to Slovakia. This was the best of both worlds- David got to visit his dream city, and I got to see somewhere new and check off a new country!

Well, we all did. Our updated country tallies are 22 (Marissa), 12 (David), 5 (Magnolia), and 4 (Rosalie). I think it's a great life goal for the girls' country tallies to always surpass their ages. See bottom of the post for my country count :)

Getting to Bratislava, Slovakia was as easy as hopping on an hour-long train ride from the Wien Hauptbahnhof.

We enjoyed the relaxing ride on an old-fashioned style train with compartments.

Please note the pile of stuffed animals on my lap. Very proud that we managed to not lose any of them on this trip.

Despite the short distance geographically, the Bratislava train station felt worlds away from Vienna pretty immediately. We were surrounded by a different language that we understood none of, and it felt a bit like stepping back in time. Everything was older and smaller than in wealthier and more modern Vienna.

Our first adventure was finding the right tram to get to the city center. It took several train station employees helping and us carrying the double stroller up and down a few flights of stairs, but we made it.

We saw some grim Communist-era architecture on our way to the historic part of the city, but when we got off the tram it looked like a fairy tale in less than a block. I'm proud we were able to get off at the right stop, because all of them sounded something like Námestie Ľudovíta Štúra.

This wasn't the worst looking part of the city, but here's a glimpse of some plainer buildings, plus all of the tram lines.

Our first stop was lunch at the Bratislava Flagship Restaurant. The building used to be a monastery, but was converted into a movie theater when the Communists sent all of the monks to the gulag in 1950.

It was interesting to see remnants of both the monastery and movie theater in the building style, but the best part was the food. We didn't have very long to experience Slovakia, so it was nice to feel like we were getting a taste (literally) of Eastern European culture through the cuisine.

I tried sheep cheese pierogis and a potato pancake. Everyone thought their food was delicious.

Afterwards we wandered toward the center of the Old Town through Michael's Gate- the last remnant of the medieval fortifications that used to surround the city.

This street was very touristy with lots of shopping. I quickly found some adorable hats for the girls that were a necessary purchase.

We took our time making our way to the main square. It was a pretty magical place to wander- especially thanks to a few hidden alleyways, and a beautiful bakery we peeked into (Konditerei Kormuth).

The main square was a great place to let small children run around. And dance around. And for Rosalie to have a bit of a 2 year old pout moment.

We walked around the courtyard of the old city hall and explored a church.

There was more to see (not a ton more; it's a small city), but we wanted to quit while all still enjoying ourselves.. so after a bit more walking we decided to head back to Austria.

There was a bit of stress when our train was cancelled and we couldn't find any information about why or when the next train was. We ended up having to wait for over an hour (in thick clouds of cigarette smoke outside the station), but it all worked out in the end.

Thankfully I had stopped at a local supermarket and toy store and had some extra snacks and sticker books for the wait. It was exciting to shop and see that Bratislava prices were drastically lower than Vienna prices.