Few days in Paradise

They call it "Slovenský Raj" or Slovak Paradise. It is a mountain range in the Slovak Republic known for its waterfalls, deep ravines and a huge, very impressive ice cave. It is wild, untamed-- a perfect place to commune with nature.

The road to Paradise is long and winding. It is a back-aching, gas-spending 9-hour drive from Prague.

When I asked A why it's called such, his answer made sense; It's maybe because it's the closest a place could get to the paradise Adam and Eve once inhabited-- natural, unspoiled, simply beautiful.

A few days there made me experience not just the hits but also the misses. Nothing is perfect, not even in Paradise. Let's start with the hits:

1. The place itself. It's awesome. The ravines, the crisp fresh air, the clear clear streams, everything is awesome. Make sure your boots are made for walking as you will surely walk a lot. Not just walk but climb those steep hills and rocky mountains. The view from the top of those rocky mountains will surely give you a feeling of natural high.

It was raining hard the day we arrived so the next day the trails were slippery. Thank goodness my Adidas, though made for tennis, held on.

Tourists I saw were mostly from neighboring countries. How it stayed under the Western radar is beyond me.

2. The Dobšinská Ladová Jaskyňa (Dobsinska Ice Cave) is exceptional. Whatever I'll say about it may not give justification to the place so I'll leave it to your imagination. I'll just say it's certainly worth a visit and that I have never seen anything like it. However, how tourism there is handled is for me not a hit but a clear miss.

MISSED ME

I'm not a fussy traveler. I get easily pleased, but this time I just can't help being irked at some things I experienced there.

1. The hotel service. It wasn't the Ritz so of course I wasn't expecting top-notch service. We stayed in Cingov Hotel which charged us 1,500sk/night. Not high-end but not low-class, either. Then there was this 90sk parking fee per day, 150sk if you eat breakfast and surprise surprise, when we received the bill we realized we got charged an extra 30sk for "bathroom tax."

Okay, let's get this straight. Shouldn't hotels provide free parking for their customers? What happend to good ol' customer service?

Bathroom tax? I haven't heard anything this ridiculous before. Is this an EU/Schengen shenanigan or is it simply a Slovakian thing? Yes, it's just 30sk but the whole idea makes me silently scream WTF. (What's The Fuss, children. I'm a preschool teacher here.)

2. At the Ice Cave, the entrance fee is 200sk per person. It was A who bought the tickets so I didn't know they charge another 300sk extra for taking pictures inside. A also said he wasn't asked or told about it. I snapped one and was immediately asked by the guide if I had the ticket for it. Boy, was I pissed to death. No, make it livid. One from not knowing I had to pay extra and two for the fact that you had to pay extra. I mean 200sk is not cheap for a 20-minute tour. On top of that, the guide spoke Slovak so I didn't understand one darn thing.

Of course it's their language and whenever they want to use it is their prerogative. Point is, shouldn't you be given the choice if you wanted an English tour or not? Shouldn't you be asked or told at least? Nobody said anything at the ticket counter. The guide fired away in ratatatatat Slovak and most of us, the Germans, the Polish, the Hungarians, and of course, one livid Filipina that is me, were lost in our own translations.

That's not the end of it all. I was badly in need for a toilet but boy oh boy, the toilet available was one hell of a kind, pun intended. It definitely deserves a separate post in this blog.

3. The road directions. Or simply the absence of them in some parts of the country. Take this as an example; you see a crossroad ahead and you don't see a single sign where the roads will lead. You cross your fingers and turn left and voila, 100 meters later you will see the sign. Lucky you if you wanted to go that way. What if not? Then you would cuss and swear, cuss and swear. I swore so much there that I was afraid the ground would open and swallow me whole. If you're a Catholic, I'm sure you'd get my drift...

Another problem wasn't the absence of sign but its presence. On our way to Stratena from Cingov, there was a fork which said Stratena to the left and Poprad to the right. We went left only to find out 15 minutes later a NO ENTRY sign for motor vehicles. Bummer.

That's not all. I'll rant some more. Sometimes you would find a fork which has a sign to the left but not to the right. The greatest mystery of all was our map indicated there should be a big road to the left before Dobsina from the cave that would lead us to Spisska Nova Ves then back to Cingov. Nada. There was only one small road and the sign said a name of a small village's. Either the road directions malfunctioned again or the publishers just made up the road and the towns along it.

"Hala, posing Inday kay panagsa ra ni..." At Tomasovsky Vyhlad after an hour of walking and climbing the slippery trail. Of course I struck a pose as a way of proclaiming "Heya all! I came, I slipped, I conquered!"

For more pictures of this trip, please click HERE.

Each travel experience gives you something to cherish or to forget. The Slovakian trip gave me one thing I'll keep-- the picture of Paradise in my mind. I'll even cherish the experiences I just ranted above because I realized I can really laugh at my own misfortunes and misadventures, and that alone made the Slovakian trip quite unique.