October 4, 2014
This morning was a cloudy and cool morning and we walked to
the
Primatial
Palace square to meet our guide for the palace tour.
The palace was built in the classical style
around 1780 for the archbishop and is well known for the signing of the Treaty
of Bratislava between France and Austria in the Hall of Mirrors in 1805.
The courtyard, in the entryway,
contains a stature of St. George slaying the dragon.
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| Primatial Palace |
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| Primatial Palace Square Panorama |
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| St. George Slaying the Dragon |
Inside, we saw the unique tapestries discovered behind a
wall during palace renovations in 1903.
These were woven in the
royal tapestry works in Mortlake,
England, in the 1630s. They form a series of six, depicting the ancient legend
of Hero and Leander
and their tragic love for each other.
After the palace tour we walked through
the Old Town to the Old Opera House where we boarded the Old Timers Tour cars
for a tour through the narrow streets of Old Town,
which took us past St.
Martins where the Hungarian kings/queens were crowned, St. Michael’s Gate, and
the numerous other churches and former palaces.
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| Old Timers Tour Bus |
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| St. Martins |
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| St. Michaels Gate |
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| Old Opera House |
We then boarded another car-train for a ride to the castle, which
overlooks the city. From the castle
grounds, we had a great view of the Danube and Old Town Bratislava with St.
Martins in the foreground.
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| Old Town with St. Martins |
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| Crown on St. Martins' Spire |
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| St. Martin's Dome |
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| Fall Colors Above Old Town |
The present
day castle is a reconstruction begun in the second half of the 20th
century of the abandoned castle complex that was destroyed by fire in
1811. In its heyday, it was the seat of
the Hungarian monarchs with the crown jewels being kept there. Returning to Old Town, we gathered at Divna
Muse for lunch, our main meal today. Our
menu consisted of pear/goat cheese with pesto walnut salad, veal steak (filet
mignon) with potatoes, and a cheesecake with strawberries and a mint and
raspberry drizzle. It definitely was our
main meal.
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| Millimole Having a Good Time |
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| Gathering for Lunch at Divna Muse |
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| Pear, Goat Cheese with Walnut Pesto Salad |
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| Veal Steak with Sauteed Romaine |
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| Cheesecake with Mint/Raspberry Drizzle |
From the restaurant, we went
next door to the wine museum and wine tasting.
With little time remaining in the afternoon, we proceeded directly to
the wine tasting in the cellar. In
Slovakia, about 70% of the wine production is white wine. We had a 4 wine tasting and I purchased a
bottle of Frankovka
modrá, which is a red wine, for our enjoyment later this evening. Because the wine production in Slovakia is
smaller than the wine consumption, Slovakian wines are rarely exported. Because it was now 17:00, we had no time for
the Bratislava Museum before gathering at 17:45 for our walk to the bus stop to
catch X13 to the New Opera/Ballet complex for our ballet this evening.
We arrived at the Ballet early and had
time to wander around the area, which is new with a large 4-story mall located
on the Danube.
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| Gathering for Ballet |
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| New Opera/Ballet House |
From here you can see the Castle overlooking Bratislava.
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| Castle Above Bratislava |
Once the hall opened for
seating, we took our seats, which had an excellent view of the stage, for the
performance of Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet”.
The choreography, music, and costumes for performance were all
outstanding. It was a most enjoyable
experience and was quite spectacular.
Tomorrow we have a free morning and
then will be travelling to Budapest in the afternoon. That will be our last city on our tour of
East Central/East Europe.
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