Today we left the ship having arranged a taxi to our apartment. We were met at the apartment and were introduced to it. When we looked at the apartment on the internet it looked a bit like a mini palace with high ceilings and large rooms. We know that wide angle lenses are used for photographs for apartment advertising but in this case the apartment was what they had been depicted. Of some concern was the fact that there were 3 locks that had to be opened to get in with two of them being dead locks - one on the outer door and one on the inner door. The 3rd one is like the bar dropped in on an old medieval gate although our one slides across. We were told to make sure they were all locked when we left the building which also had secure access on the entrance.

The apartment is located on a main road at the edge of the Jewish district. After settling in we headed for the old market which we had seen from the bus yesterday. This is in an old building and was full of the usual stalls. Also called into a mini supermarket (SPAR) on the way back. This one was in another old building with vaulted ceiling. Bruce was admonished by the manager for taking a picture of it! Not sure what that was about.

Similar to Bratislava many of the buildings are in need of repair from their communist days. After communism the new government gave apartments back to people who could prove they owned them previously and sold the rest. This absolved them of the repair responsibility and enabled them to focus on the more urgent issues. Assuming strata systems even exist within the apartment buildings it will take some time to save up to do the exterior renovations. One can however see through this and those that have been repaired are beautiful. On the way back we passed a Jewish Street Food place and will investigate it further another day.

Tonight we went out to dinner up the road. The owner of the apartment had recommended a restaurant called Menza. It was situated in a pedestrian mall close by but was unfortunately booked out. We will try going later in the week but were not prepared to make a reservation yet. We went to another one, Cafe Vian, which was really good - good service, good food and full of people.