fan of beast Posted December 27, 2007 Share Posted December 27, 2007 st. elizabeth's cathedral main street castle at krasna horka ruins at terniany slanec ruins remnants of a bygone era apartments s****ka castle narrow streets hc kosice hockey that had to hurt plaque how did that get in there? BODDA requested a trip report, so here we go. my job sent me to slovakia to help in the construction of a new jobsite at us steel. slovakia is a beautiful country with some of the nicest and hardest working people you will ever find. this area was settled around the 5th century. the city of kosice has buildings that are 2-3 times as old as the usa. the flight takes about 16 hours unless you have an ordeal like my 2nd trip over. after delays at cvg caused me to miss my international flight to vienna, they got me rerouted to o'hare to catch a plane to munich. the chicago flight was delayed. i arrived in munich 10 minutes late for my connection to vienna. i had to sit in the airport for 8 hours. they rerouted me again. this time to prague. when i landed in prague, i had 10 minutes to get thru passport control and to my gate. they were boarding the plane as i got there. finally landed in kosice after 29 hours. on days off, i went castle hunting. attached are some pics of the castles i visited. only one is intact. the castle at krasna horka was built in the 13th century. parts were rebuilt after a fire in the 16th century. this castle was inhabited until the 1940's. it then became a national museum. the others are ruins with just a few pieces still standing. the castle at s****ka is rumored to be where they filmed parts of braveheart. i have not confirmed that. a lot of the streets in the downtown areas are off limits to cars. the people here walk or take the buses and trolleys. i did more walking here than a full day at KI. when they say that america is the most obese nation in the world they aren't kidding. i felt like an elephant walking around. food here is very inexpensive. everything else is expensive. a flat here will cost about $400,000. most people live in apartments left over from the communist regimes. there are apartment buildings as far as you can see. you only see houses in the small towns outside the main city. the cars here are all stick shift subcompacts. the main highways have no speed limits but, these cars won't go much over 80 mph. i go back here in a couple of weeks. i have already spent 8 weeks there. if they had roller coasters, i would move there. one of the pics shows a plaque on the front of the jewish synagogue. i am still trying to find its meaning. i believe it is honoring the jews that were killed during the holocaust. it is a very strange looking plaque. i was invited to speak to the students at the english language school. this was an experience i'll never forget. one of the ladies there asked if i could sneak her an american husband in my suitcase. hey gordon, are you ready to take a ride? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Interpreter Posted December 27, 2007 Share Posted December 27, 2007 Wow! Thanks for the great trip report! (And thanks to Boddah for asking!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Avatar Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 I agree, your report was a great and interesting read. I noticed that in your hockey picture it looks like the rink is a Olympic size rink, I have always enjoyed watching hockey games played on the larger ice slabs. Also is that a catapult that you are standing by in one of your pictures, if so man that thing looks huge. Well thanks for sharing and I hope your time home is blissful for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fan of beast Posted December 28, 2007 Author Share Posted December 28, 2007 yes, that is a catapult. it was huge. the ice is olympic size. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tubaman Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 Was it a catapult, or a trebuchet? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fan of beast Posted December 28, 2007 Author Share Posted December 28, 2007 Was it a catapult, or a trebuchet? i looked up the difference. it would be a trebuchet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gordon Bombay Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 Fan of Beast, awesome pictures and report, I'm very glad you posted it. You were right, it is a very photogenic place, about how much does a plane ticket cost to get there? (And that girl looking for a husband, got a picture? ) I've always been fascinated by the former soviet block nations and see all the remnants left over from the former communist regimes. I'd really love to visit Pripyat, Ukraine (the town that used to have 50,000 occupants but was abandoned after the Chernobyl Disaster (yes tours are legal, and yes they are safe)). Fan of Beast, what exactly is your company building there and will you be back in time for summer at Kings Island? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tubaman Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 Fan of Beast, awesome pictures and report, I'm very glad you posted it. You were right, it is a very photogenic place, about how much does a plane ticket cost to get there? (And that girl looking for a husband, got a picture? ) I've always been fascinated by the former soviet block nations and see all the remnants left over from the former communist regimes. I'd really love to visit Pripyat, Ukraine (the town that used to have 50,000 occupants but was abandoned after the Chernobyl Disaster (yes tours are legal, and yes they are safe)). Fan of Beast, what exactly is your company building there and will you be back in time for summer at Kings Island? Gordon Bombay, you do urban exploring right? I must agree that I would love to visit abandoned places such as those. I'm glad you posted the pictures, they are really fascinating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tubaman Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 You also mentioned working for US Steel right? Is that the US Steel symbol on the hockey ice? (sorry for the double post) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoddaH1994 Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 Wow! Very interesting! Next time your parents tell you to log off KIC and get back to doing homework, remember that KIC can be a social studies lesson too. ha ha I've always wanted to check out some other countries, but haven't ventured past the US and Canada. It must be really interesting meeting new people from around the world. Are the Slovakian people as passionate about hockey as the rest of eastern Europe? An interesting fact is that fighting in hockey is unique to North America. It's not allowed in other areas of the world and is cause for at the very least immediate ejection. Great trip report! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fan of beast Posted December 28, 2007 Author Share Posted December 28, 2007 i work for a contractor to steel mills. i am in the scarfing division which uses a scarfing robot to condition steel slabs before they are rolled into coils. this improves the quality of the steel, is a lot safer, and is more environmentally friendly. for years this was done with a hand torch. the hockey arena was built by us steel and is called the us steel arena. the europeans are passionate about all sports, especially hockey and soccer. they throw a lot of support behind the local women's basketball team, also. i should be back in the states in time for roller coaster season. we have a project going in russia. i don't know yet if i'm going to be on that team. next on the plate is detroit(not far from CP). i spent all last summer at philly. never made it to dorney. yes, gordon, that girl was cute. i now know where all those models you see in american magazines come from. Kosice is only about 80 kilometers from Ukraine. it is south of poland and the czech republic. west of ukraine. north of hungary. east of austria. i hope i answered all the questions from the previous posts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
italianchef Posted December 31, 2007 Share Posted December 31, 2007 WOW!!! What a beautiful country. I hope to visit Slovak someday. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adventure2007 Posted December 31, 2007 Share Posted December 31, 2007 Those are some really amazing pictures. I am glad you had a good time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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