Bratislava

We hit the road this weekend for a quick 2 hour drive to Bratislava, Slovakia.  Why Bratislava? It is close and we hadn't yet been there, so why not? We stayed at a nice, small hotel about a 5 minute walk from Old Town.  We were a little afraid when we drove into the "parking garage" and found 4 spaces. Hmm.

                                       
But, the hotel turned out to be lovely and modern and spacious...we had a huge room with a king size bed and a pull out couch, plus a sitting area. There were 3 TV's and a computer in the room.  I would recommend Danubia Gate for anyone travelling to Bratislava. It also had a small children's play area.
                                     
Our room wasn't quite ready when we arrived, so we bundled up and headed out in search of lunch. We saw the usual McD's and KFC, but were on the hunt for something a little more authentic. But, when we turned a corner and saw a sign for Sbarro, I couldn't resist. It was across from an ice rink and for a brief moment I felt like I was at the Houston Galleria.
                                       
After lunch, we strolled though Old Town. The Old Town was picturesque..and a bit deserted.
                               
The picture above is the "Main Square". On a Saturday. In the middle of the day. Where, oh where, are the people? It was strange. It was also great, because the kids could run freely up and down the streets.
                                        

They enjoyed pretending to shoot the cannon and posing with random statues. 

                                        

           

This is St Martin's Cathedral, where several Hungarian kings were crowned during the almost 1000 years that Bratislava was part of Hungary. On the top of the steeple is a replica of the Hungarian crown. 

Across from the church was a wonderful children's museum, Bibiana.  I would recommend it for anyone with small kids. They had many rooms with different projects or play things in each room. 

                                             

Fun baking room

Pretend snow

 Mister man likes to use "skissors"

Under the Sea

Painting glass tiles

                           After our time there, we stopped for some coffee and dessert to warm up.

Option 1

Option 2

We are not so mean as to eat dessert and only allow our kids to have fruit...instead, Cade refused to try the cake and begged for an orange that he saw on the counter. Alrighty, then. 

Next up - the Bratislava Zoo...it needs a post to itself!

O Christmas Tree

Yesterday, we decided to search for a Christmas tree. A little early, yes, but we will go back to the US for Christmas and we wanted to enjoy our Christmas decorations for a few weeks.  We have seen artificial trees at a few places, but I kind of wanted a real one. So, we headed to a nursery we were familiar with to see if they had any in stock. Side note - in Hungarian, plant nurseries are called fa iskola, or tree school. I love that.  We arrived at the nursery and found someone that spoke a little English. He led us to a place where there were several rows of trees. But, they were tiny. Like, 3-4 feet tiny. Not exactly what I had in mind.  In the moment, we were trying to get all the information we could and I asked the stupid American question of the day..."Is this normal?"

 In addition to the small size, the trees gave a new definition to "live tree". They all had their root balls still attached. What??? What is that about?? We proceeded to ask the next stupid question of the day.  "What if we just want to throw it away after Christmas?" The nice salesmen were very patient with our ignorance. Apparently here, or at least at that nursery (we have yet to verify this with anyone else), people don't throw the trees away. What a waste that is. Instead, you plant them in a pot until Christmas, and then afterwards you can plant them in your garden. Next year, you can dig it back up and use it again! 2 for the price of one!

At that moment, I was ready to leave and go get a fake one, but Larry thought we should have the full Hungarian Christmas tree experience. So, we picked out the tallest one (about 4 feet). The nice men potted it for us and got it all ready (which doubled the price, maybe we got the special ignorant American deal). They shoved the poor tree in the back of my SUV and off we went.

We got home and had to use a dolly to get it up the stairs. It is super heavy.

We found a little spot for it and let the kids decorate it. They had loads of fun. Cade really appreciates that I have placed all of these shiny balls out for his enjoyment. He is a brilliant child, already experimenting to see which ones bounce, which ones roll, and which ones shatter.  

 It certainly won't win any "most beautiful tree" contests, but it has character. And we laughed. And we made memories. And that is more important than having a 10 foot tree.

A Fun Day at the Vidampark

Trying to take advantage of the sunshine, we visited the Budapest Vidampark on Saturday. It is Budapest's only amusement park, and it is quite amusing in more ways than one. Inside the gates, it resembles a parking lot carnival.  The amusement park was built in the 1950's, and I think some of the rides have never been updated. In spite of some questionable safety issues, we all had a fun time.

There was a cute little kids area with little rides and a playground. 

Notice Chelsea's left hand over Cade's shoulder....the rides pretty much all lacked seat belts. This one bumped up and down and went in a circle pretty quickly. She was a good big sis and Cade didn't fall out!

The kid ferris wheel...here I was formulating my strategy on how to catch Cade if he decided to stand up.

He didn't like the rides that went in the dark..."All done! Scary!"

This was the most memorable ride of all...the Hullamvasut.  It is a giant wooden roller coaster built in the 1920's and is the oldest operating roller coaster in central Europe. 

There were NO seat belts or lap bars, and the seats had springs underneath for that extra bounce!

This man was the brake guy.  I later read that this roller coaster is called a side friction roller coaster and has nothing to keep the cars from flying off the track, thus the brakeman. Yikes!  

We took Chelsea on the ride and she LOVED it. I held onto her for dear life and prayed. There were some pretty decent sized drops, and without any restraining devices it was a bit scary! There is an overall theme of personal responsibility in Hungary, but this took it to a new level.  Thankfully, we all survived and had a really fun day.

Trip to the Pumpkin Patch

Fall means it is time for the annual pumpkin patch pictures. We heard about about a Pumpkin Festival in a the town of Zebegeny with a pumpkin patch, rides, and more! Fun!  

To get there, we took our first Hungarian train ride outside of Budapest.  Getting on the train was an experience in itself. We arrived at the station close to departure time. We felt like we were on the Amazing Race as we tried to find the ticket counter.  We found it, waited in line, and Larry used his Hungarian to get us a csaladi jegy, or family ticket. Strangely enough, if you get a family ticket, the kids are free and the adult tickets are discounted. How that works out, I'm not sure!  

From the ticket counter, we hurried to find the train with only a few minutes to spare. We arrived at the platform and began looking in the train cars for seats - every car was packed! I was shocked! At this point, we were running down the platform with both kids, trying to make our way to a car with some empty seats. We ended up at the end of the train, and we still didn't find 4 seats. Crazy! We sat, took a deep breath, and took a pleasant one hour journey to Zebegeny. There, the pumpkin hunt began.  

 We have been here a year. After last year's Halloween experience, we should know that festivals here are a little different than in the US. After fruitlessly hunting for the great fields of pumpkins that I had conjured up in my head, we decided the "patch" was a little row of pumpkins. Oh well.

The kids still posed with pumpkins, so mission was semi accomplished. 

 This was the best outfit...how awesome is her hat??

 The only ride we found was the great Hungarian swing. You put your kid in a basket and someone stands in the middle and turns a wheel to make it go. Quite fun!  It would never fly in the States, because some kid would stand up and fall out and sue someone.

 New experiences, new memories, something new to laugh about....all in all, a successful adventure.

First Timers!

Parliament

We have enjoyed having Larry's parents here for the last 2 weeks and showing them around our great city and beyond. It was their first trip overseas, and we were so proud of them for being brave enough to come and experience life here. They enjoyed it and it was fun listening to their observations about how different things are here! What, no ice? I don't think they are ready to trade in their American conveniences and move to Europe!

Visiting Szentendre

Picnic at AISB

While they were here, we hit most of the Budapest highlights. We also took a long weekend trip to Austria, making stops in Linz, Salzburg, and Vienna. It was our first time to Linz, and we enjoyed our time there. I thought it was a nice mix of the feel of Vienna and Salzburg. We stumbled upon this cute little parade....

After walking through the main street, we took a train up the mountain in Linz. At the top is a fun little place called the Grottenbahn. It was really cute and my kids loved it. It is a little fairy tale ride and fairy tale village, with scenes from all the well known fairy tales. We had a fun time there, and I would recommend it for anyone with small children.

From Linz, we made a quick trip to Salzburg. The flowers were beautiful, as always!  We enjoyed a leisurely morning in Old Town while Geney and Wilbron did the Sound of Music Tour. 

On the way home, we spent the night in Vienna. It was a bit cold and rainy, so we didn't spend much time there before heading back to Budapest.

We have been blessed to have several visitors since we moved here....it is always fun and we are thankful for everyone who makes the long trip to visit!

Split, Croatia

Split, Croatia  - our last stop before returning to Venice.  

We decided to have a low key beach day and took a taxi to Bene beach.

 

 Beach = happy kids!

 Cracker break

Let's get back in!

The crystal clear water was cold, but bearable. We all swam with our flip flops on, as the beaches in Croatia are painfully rocky to bare feet.

The cruise was such a great time for our family. We all came back refreshed and ready to start the school year.  We can't wait to take another cruise!