The first time we visited Slovakia was between Hungary and Czech Republic but it was a rushed trip so that we could catch up with Ben in Prague. We decided we would visit Bratislava after going through Germany and into Austria because we knew we would visit Vienna and it is only some 70 Ks to Bratislava from Vienna, so that puts you in the picture. Our first visit took us to Trenčin where we stayed in a campground on an island in the river, it sounded nice on the Internet, but fell short when we got there, as they often do. Trenčin was a nice little city with a castle on a hill over looking the city. The view from the castle was most impressive and the castle itself was quite good, in the city there were the usual pedestrian only streets with lovely old buildings and cobble stoned streets. We only spent one day in Trenčin because of getting to Prague, but when we left we took a detour to another castle that was in the opposite direction to the way we needed to head. The castle was Bojnice Castle and dated back to the twelfth century, though originally it was made of wood, it was changed to stone in the thirteenth century. You could only see the castle with a guide, unfortunately not in English, we were given the information in print. It was an amazing castle in excellent condition and the tour was good too, taking us through a lot of the castle, even down into a cave under the castle. Then we had to leave for Prague, we would returned to have a look at the capital Bratislava later. Bratislava was a bit of a surprise, for a start there were more tourist groups here than we had seen in any other city! It was also a compact city, which made it easy for us to get around. The campground we stayed in was a little way out of the city and looked a bit dodgy with signs warning about theft and a guard on the entrance, it turned out not to be a problem and we even stayed there while we visited Vienna. The tram was very easy to catch into the city and only took 25 minutes. In the city we caught a tourist bus to take us around the greater area of the city before we walked around the inner city and also crossed the Danube River to walk through a park on the other side. The city has a large palace that over looks it and dates back to the nineteenth century, while the city center has the old buildings and cobble stoned streets we are so used to. The old areas were lovely to look at and only spoiled by the ever present graffiti we find in these poorer cities. One thing that impressed us about Bratislava was its network of trams and electric buses, for a city with a reported population of only 500,000, it was brilliant and larger cities could learn a thing or two. Slovakia gave us the impression that it needed a lot more investigation, it was a pity we didn't have more time to look around other areas of the country.