What I learned from my brief visit to Slovakia;

• The country split off from the Czech Republic which was previously known as Czechoslovakia, which dissolved in 1993.
• Some of the iron curtain legacies are used for history and curious amusement for western tourists who might be fascinated by socialism, like this firing range with eastern European weapons
• This country is a recent (2004) member of the EU and uses the Euro currency. (since 2009)
• There was a scandal involving the Slovakian government, the Mafia and shooting of a local journalist.  I’ll cover this in part 5.
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• There is this nice outdoor display during Easter which I really like.   No political correctness here thank goodness.
• The streets look clean and supermarkets like Lidl have incentives for people to recycle, you post your empty plastic bottles into a machine to get a printed voucher off your shopping.
• There is a holocaust statue to remember the loss of Jewish people who met tragedy here.
• This country shares the Danube river with Vienna, Austria and Budapest, Hungary.
• This seems like a modern and pleasant country and is quite cheap to eat out although isn’t a huge amount to do here, and I only stayed two nights.
• There is a huge castle that overlooks the Danube.   Bratislava castle has some parts of it that date from the 13th century.

1. Austria’s neighbour and travel hacks – 2. River Danube – 3. Strange mirrored museum – 4. Things I learned from my visit to Slovakia – 5. Slovakia protests and strange goings on