Bratislava- Komarno, 23 July

Leaving Marina Bratislava at 8 am. We are keeping company with Hans and Thea through the Kanal Gabcikovo, 34 km, with an enormous lock near the end. We have read and been warned that this is a difficult and unpleasant trip if it is windy, and that it is difficult to tie up in the lock. But it all worked out well. The weather was fine, but it was a little bit boring.

Yacht Club Bratislava from sea side. 

 The Yachtclub Bratislava from land side. 

Elli waving good bye in the morning. 

Next stop Yachtclub Komarno, 100 km from Bratislava. 

Quite an uninteresting part of the river, which is very wide here. After the lock the river forms the border between Slovakia and Hungary. On the Hungarian side of the river there are 3 fortresses, the largest of their tule in Europe.

Yachtclub Komarno is run by Miro, a friend of Elli (Bratislava). Nearest supermarket, 2 km in one direction and centre of town 3 km in the other direction. The Yachtclub was situated in a quite arm of the river but close to a run down harbour and boat warf. Reminds one of uof previous governments! 

But the little town shows ambitions of improving. They have an area which they call Europa city where they have built  structures from different parts of Europe.

A street in Komarno.

Miro, the hafenmeister, has a restaurant about 400 m from the Yachtclub where we enjoyed a meal with Hans and Thea. 

Tomorrow we have to get up very early to reach a town Esztergom before 9 am where Carl has organised a telephone conference.

Vienna - Bratislava, 22 July

I The Hapsburgers and Vienna will have to wait until our next visit. We decide to leave the marina at 6 am so that we can arrive in Bratislava in the early afternoon. We only have one lock to pass through and it is just a few km from Vienna. The last lock in Austria, joy!

Arrived at the lock early, please lock meister let us through, but we had to wait for 1 hour and 30 minutes before we could enter behind an enormous double barge. 

Breakfast while waiting for the lock.

All along the river from Vienna, in Austria, we saw these little holiday houses, with big nets erected on poles hanging over the river.

Small houses on stilts all along the riverbank after leaving Vienna. 

And one more little house.

We read that as we leave Austria we will see the Braunberg, and we thought this was it, it it was not.

Dead trees along the banks of the river, presumably after last years floods.

The Braunberg, the real one,

Hainsburg, the last town in Austria.

Ruins outside Hainsburg.

Same Ruins of an roman castle

And so we enter Slovakia and into Bratislava. The Bratislava castle from the river. 

We stayed in the Bratslava marina about 8 km out of the town. The daughter of the owner gave us a lift into town and fetched us 4 hours later. We needed internet so spent 1 hour and two cokes at MacDonalds before setting off to see the sights. Bratislava is a place of contrasts. There is the old town, the "in" town the, old soviet style town and the depalidated town. But charming none the less.

We walked unto the castle which is built on a Stone Age site. We read about King Sigimund and that 19 kings/queens were crowned in Bratislava. We have discovered that our knowledge of Slovakia is naught. Going to have to do something about it!

The Donau seen from the castle. The UFO like thing on top of the bridge support is actually called the UFO. Inside is a famous and popular restaurant. 

At the castle

Säpoluc on his horse and Carl keeping him upright. This is knight from 700 something and probably needs some support. Never heard of him and I think Carl got the spelling wrong.

I have now done a bit of research and found out that this is a statue of Svätopluk, the greatest king of the Moravian Empire, round 800 AD.

Leslie in front of the city on the left bank 

City from Castle view.

City life seen from gutter level.

City life seen from a sidewalk cafe. 

At marina Bratislava we met up with Hans and Thea again.  We met them previously in Vienna. They are also on their way to the Black Sea. We all enjoyed a superb dinner at Elli's Hexe pontoon restaurant.  Elli is the owner of the marina and a wonderful warm person. 

Vienna, 20-21 July

I, Carl have been passing Vienna airport about 50 times but only visited the city twice. First time with Leslie on our 10th wedding anniversary. Second time due to flight delays, Jan Lundin and I took the opportunity to have coffee in the city. But this is first time to visit Vienna in summer time. As a German friend puts it "Honestly spoken" Vienna is much more impressive and better in the summer. 

First stop in Vienna, apfelstrudel and coffee.

Twenty years ago we ate a Sacher torte at this hotel. Cannot manage a Sacher torte today after the apfelstrudel, must be getting older!

Museum Viertel  in Vienna, a wonderful, big, area with easy atmosphere where old and modern museums and art galleries are gathered. This the MUMOK, art museum. The open area has lots of bed shaped benches which are very comfortable to lie in. The light blue shirt in the one in the foreground is Carl enjoying a rest.

Another view of the Museum viertal with older buildings.

Resting in the beds! Vienna is full of tourists, all ages and all nationalities. And it was really hot. We took the U- bahn into the city, very clean and fast. Found a café opposite Cartier and spend our time watching a "bouncer"?? Doing his job outside the shop. Dressed in a suit with an ear phone he paraded up and down in front only to let in certain people. We spied another character just standing and watching the shop and thought we might even see a robbery. But nothing so exciting happened.

St Stephans Catherdral with the beautiful roof. We walked through Maria Theresia Platz, Helden Platz in Hofburg where the Hapsburgare lived for 600 years. We need to check our facts since we do not know so much about the Hapsburgs, but it seems that Maria Theresia was a very prominent figure. We have enough research to do to keep us busy for many years to come.

Krems- Vienna, 20 July

Only 75 km to Vienna. And 2 Schleusse. Nothing to worry about. The Krems marineros were slowly  waking up from the marilen (apricot) party. Les and I took a walk through the old town of Krems. Beautifullly old and well preserved. We have to come back the the old Post Hotel. They have a lovely inner yard surrounded by the balcony a rooms. 

The magnificent Benediktiner kloster Götweig is seen in a distance. 

The wine growing hillsides of Krems Und Stein..

I, Carl was interested in this piece of art. Or was it a real thing from the past to hold Anababtist for public viewing?

Early morning walk through Krems while waiting for the diesel station to open at 10.00.

The towns Krems and Stein have joined into one town. The hafenmeister told as that between Krems ans Stein is the town "und". This was his joke, Krems, Und, Stein. Ha ha.

This weekend Stein is having a Marilen festival and the whole town is geared up to serving apricots in every conceivable way, even, wait for it, apricot knödel!

The beautiful Post Hotel where Carl has promised that we comeback back to, on land!

We have now on two occasions learnt from friendly Austrians that we have managed to find the most popular, local, places. In Grein we were at Cafe Schörli, and in Krems, the Heurigen in a little village, Egelsee, where we were told that  95 procent of the guests were from that area. Heurigens get permission from the local authorities to sell their wine and locally farm produced food at certain given times during the year. Heurigen Wittmann had a few weeks in July and August to do this.  Other farmers are also allocated times when they do the same. A farmer may not advertise with posters that he has an open Heurigen, but decorates his entrance with flowers and vegetable displays. Great idea and we will return.

Entering Vienna. We saw these unusual fishing boats.

Bought a bag  of apricots, this is the last one. These are the best apricots i have ever tasted, and I come from apricot country.

Passet the 2000 km mark, 2000 km to Black Sea. It was so windy and choppy it was difficult to keep the camera stil.

For about 1 hour after Krems we passed through beautiful countryside with hills an vineyards on the left bank. Even the Danube was friendly and calm, except for all the enormous tourist boats we met. After an hour or two, the river became much wider and the scenery quite uninteresting. And the wind came up, might as well have been on the sea! Of course Carl loves it!

On entering Vienna after nearly 6 hours in wind and waves, we spotted a speed boat with 3 people on boards who seemed to be calling for help. I was hoping that they were just waving, but Carl insisted on finding out if they needed help. And of course they did so we towed them into the marina about 3 km down the river. Good on you Carl, for helping people in need.

Grein-Krems, 19 July

We meat Jürgen in the morning. He is also on way to the Black Sea in his 27' Ulla sailing boat. He is travelling slowly but we will certainly meet up along the river as we are having a few longer breaks ahead of us. 

The cow and the calf castle. The calf is in the river. 

We are in the Wachau part of the Donau. It streches for 35 km from Melk to Krems. Beautiful area with green hillsides, vineyard, small villages, kloisters and castles.  Lots of large tourist cabin ships. 

Here is Dornstein. 

And Dornstein with castle ruin. 

Again Dornstein

Carl had been depressed for a few days due to not findng any evidence of the 30- year war Swedes. 

At last a historical record that could give a lead to the many ruins along the Donau. The Swedes were here as well. Carl is very pleased with himself because it supports his view that the full impact of the 30-year war and the Swedes role has not yet been fully understood and appreciated. Time will tell but it is good that Carl is happy. 

Look at him! He managed to find the best Heuriger in the whole of Wachau.  

Up in the mountains to the little village Eglesee and to familie  Wittmans Heurige. 

Happier than happy? 

Or happy fotographer?