Whenever I think about Bratislava, I have that one scene from the movie Eurotrip in mind. You know, when the dog sits on the side of the road with the hand it its mouth (haha). I can assure you now, that Bratislava is nothing like that. Trust me, I tried to find the dog, but failed miserably. But seriously, I recently have the urge to travel and explore Eastern European countries a little more. Last year, I started traveling to Riga, Prague and Warsaw and was excited to see what Bratislava had to offer as my next destination.

Even though I heard differently a couple of times now, I found Bratislava to be a nice little city with a beautiful historical quarter and the city is definitely worth a visit for a weekend.

We stayed at the Wild Elephant hostel, which is just a few steps away from the big square in the historical center. The hostel is alright, rooms are ok (9€/night), however the Internet pretty shitty. If you are into Vegan family meals, they offer that for 5 Euro every night, same goes for Pub crawls. Unfortunately, I have been pretty sick during my stay there, so now alcohol for me.

We arrived Friday evening and started exploring the historical center a little bit more. In December it is extra nice, because they have the christmas market right in the square and all the christmas decorations and people singing christmas songs, which puts you into the right mood.

We went to eat dinner at one of these typical Slovakian food places (it’s probably super touristy but we had to try the food eventually) called Slovak Restaurant (you can find a couple of them there). They offer very solid food, lots of meat and dumplings, but really good though. Afterwards, we went in a Pub that had live music, called Hacienda, which is located right up on Sedlárska Ulica. You can find a bunch of bars there if you want to go for a drink. I would recommend the Irish Pub The Dublin Irish right next to Hacienda. Even though it’s mostly super crowded but has a nice atmosphere to it and live music as well.

The next day, we decided to walk along the historical center during the day, went to St Martin church and up to the Bratislava castle. You have a really nice view over the city from there, nice gardens behind the castle and inside the castle you have a little museum that you can enter for 7€.

On our way to the castle, we got coffee and tea at a really cute little cafè called Kava.Bar. You should check it out, its tiny but had a nice vibe to it. Same goes for the Enjoy coffee right on Michalska street.

After our castle tour, we walked back down to the city, had lunch and decided to walk over the bridge to the other side of the river to check it out. They have a big shopping center right on the other side of the river called Aupark, so if you feel like shopping – that is your place to go. They also have a nice park that you can just chill in or walk around, or you can talk a stroll along the water. We went back on the bridge (the green one) right during sun set, so you have a beautiful view over the city lights and the castle on top of the little mountain.

Before we went to the Irish Pub in the evening for some live music, we had food on one of the food vendors on the christmas market. It’s probably nicer to walk around in the city during summer time, but the christmas market is pretty cute, so if you ever happen to be there during the winter – go check it out.

For our last day, we decided to walk up to the Slavín memorial, which is a war memorial for the soldiers and civilians that died during the world war. On our way there, we passed by the parliament (they have gardens behind it that open every day at 10, too) and made our way up to the memorial through the tiny streets of Bratislava. Its a nice 25 minute walk up there and you can have a great view over the city again, this time looking at the castle as well.

Thanks Bratislava, it’s been nice. If you need a destination for a weekend trip, Bratislava should definitely be on your list. And btw – I found the dog after all…! Ha!