Beyond The Maple Tree

Although the arranged bike tour ended in Vienna, we had originally planned to continue on our own to Bratislava, Slovakia.  However, once reaching Vienna, we changed our minds and opted to spend some extra time visiting Vienna before leaving on a late afternoon train. 

We had no idea what to expect in Bratislava and we were pleasantly surprised!  It has a really nice historical centre and we were blown away at how good the food was - very rich, but so delicious!! 

Dom’s favourite dish was Bryndzové Halušky - a gnocchi-like potato dumpling with a sheep cheese and sour cream sauce and fried bacon on top.  Jen liked the Zemiakové placky (potato pancake fried in oil) and the Svickova na Smetane (a typical Czech dish with pork tenderloin and a creamy white sauce).

After all that biking, we were really happy to treat ourselves and fill our bellies with so much yummy food!

We spent a long weekend in Balassagyarmat, Hungary, visiting our friends Peter, Krisztina, Bogi and Balasz.  Peter and Bogi picked us up from the Budapest airport in our favourite Kiss-mobile.

We helped Peter finalize the website for his new kitesurfing school in Sri Lanka (http://www.surfpoint-srilanka.com) and when the kids returned home from school, we went on a really cool semi-private tour at the local zoo.

The next day, we drove to Slovakia for a day of skiing.  It’s been well over 6 years since we’d been out to the mountains for skiing/boarding, but we took it easy and had lots of fun (despite a little rain and fog). 

On our way home, we stopped at a cozy restaurant near the Hungarian border for a really delicious meal, for less than 5 Euros.

On our last day, Peter’s dad invited us over to try some traditional Hungarian cuisine for lunch - bean soup and goulash made from stomach lining.  We really enjoyed it, especially the bean soup!

Krisztina and Bogi drove us back to Budapest where we visited a few sites in Buda and Pest before saying good bye.  We were sad, but hopefully we will see them in Sri Lanka this summer.  

Before heading to our hotel for a short nap (before our early morning flight), we stopped to check out an eclectic and funky bar called Simple Kert, for a pint of cider.

During our visit, Dom went on a sausage shopping spree after discovering all kinds of delicious Hungarian sausage.  We must have brought around 10 huge sausages back to London with us :)