Weekend: UK daily has noticed wonderful Slovak train

Are you ready for a weekend ride?


Daily Mail notices unusual Slovak attraction

The British daily has recently got fascinated by a viral video posted by one of the Twitter users, in which an old steam train is chugging through a football stadium.

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People in Slovakia are familiar with the picture. The train and a historical narrow-gauge railway that the train is driving on has grown into a sought-after tourist attraction in Čierny Balog, central Slovakia.

The British Ambassador to Slovakia, Nigel Baker, is one of several thousands of twitter users that has noticed the video. “I love the way the football match just carries on,” he tweeted.

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Many retweeted the video, expressing their wish to have such a train in their cities.

“All stadiums should aspire to have public transport connectivity like this. Game ends and a train arrives at the end of your aisle,” a Twitter user wrote.

The train continues to be a surprise to many, though it went viral on other social media several years ago.

The railway was laid in 1914. Back then, there was no football pitch. The operation of the railway stopped in the early eighties and was renewed a decade later.

Today, steam trains ride to three different locations near Čierny Balog. The trains operate on three tracks only during the summer season, always from Wednesday to Saturday.

What else you can do at the weekend:

  • Music: Grape, a musical festival, takes place in Trenčín on Friday and Saturday. Years & Years are one of the biggest names to play at the festival, but young rappers and producers from eastern Slovakia, WELOVEVERYSIMPLE, will also perform.

  • Hiking: Head to the Tatras and hike to some of the most visited places in the area.

  • Festival: Očovská Folklórna Hruda, a folk music festival, is held on Friday and Saturday in Očová, central Slovakia.

  • Children: Dragon Days, a children’s event with dragons, knights and many other fairytale characters, takes place at Budatín Castle in Žilina on Saturday and Sunday. Will children save a baby dragon?

  • Castle: Bojnice Castle has launched a virtual guide that makes the exploration of the historical construction easier.

  • Cycling: Set out on a cycling adventure across the Horehronie region, central Slovakia, trying out a new cycling route of 90 kilometres.

  • Museum: The Slovak National Museum has published a list of its most visited branches in the first half of 2022. Bojnice Castle, Museum of History in Bratislava, and Spišské Museum in eastern Slovakia top the list.

  • Swimming: Here are safe swimming spots that you can go to this weekend.


Boulder in Canada honours Slovaks

A new monument, an 11-tonne granite boulder, has been unveiled in a place in Ontario, Canada, where Slovak settlers once used to live, CBC News wrote.

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Slovak immigrants called their new home Bradlo, which is the burial place of Slovak statesman and General Milan Rastislav Štefánik in western Slovakia. He died in 1919.

Slovak established Bradlo in the early 1930s and most of them left by 1950, according to a 1997 plaque installed near a highway in Ontario.

When they lived in the area, they harvested and sold wood to pulp and paper mills.

Archaeology news

  • In just one area, near Poprad in eastern Slovakia, archaeologists have found 3,000 artifacts, including a part of a bronze belt.

  • A coin minted at the end of the 17th century has been found during research work at the Sivý Kameň castle ruins in the Trenčín Region.


Weekend read

American takes readers back to a 1993 Slovakia

Christopher Shaffer’s adventure in a newly formed Slovakia began with a painful, early 1970s Fiat Uno car ride to Banská Bystrica, a major city in central Slovakia where he would end up teaching English for half a year.

The owner of the flat that Shaffer would stay at during his stint, and share with a fellow American from Colorado, picked him up at a hotel in Stupava, a town near Bratislava, with his children and took him to the Banská Bystrica.

It was a cold January day.

“The car broke down every 30 kilometres and we would always push it to the side,” the native of Alabama recalled in a video interview with The Slovak Spectator.

Last year, he had his debut book about his Slovakia experience published in the USA.


That’s it for this week. Enjoy your weekend! - Peter

Do you have any tips? You can reach Peter at peter.dlhopolec@spectator.sk

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