D17 Trans Europa Bardejov – Kosice

Slovakia – from the land of the Slavs – has a population of 5.4 million. Land locked, independent since 1993 – it has a rather complex history going back to the Ottoman Empire, Austria-Hungary empire, WW1 carve up of Europe creating Czeckoslavakia and then the Velvet revolution post 1990 Glasnost.

Kosice is it’s 2nd City after Bratislava – it’s a steel town though the UNESCO centre is as far removed from Port Talbot’s as you can imagine. This is a Friday night and the traffic free centre is awake with locals.

Slovakia is a developed country with an advanced high-income economy. The country maintains a combination of a market economy with a comprehensive social security system, providing citizens with universal health care, free education, one of the lowest retirement age in Europe and one of the longest paid parental leaves in the OECD. Slovakia is a member of the European Union, the eurozone, the Schengen Area, the United Nations, NATO, CERN, the OECD, the WTO, the Council of Europe, the Visegrád Group, and the OSCE. Slovakia is also home to eight UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The world’s largest per-capita car producer, Slovakia manufactured a total of 1.1 million cars in 2019, representing 43% of its total industrial output.

We got here via some rolling countryside, dotted with villages, churches and bins. Today must be bin day so there was a multiple array of coloured wheely bins – which change their colour by the area they are in. Like ours it is a modern way of keeping the brain active working out what is collected when and in what.

Polands colourful shrines are replaced with most austere traditional crosses. Reminds me of the Murphy’s Iron Nails story.

Tomorrow is a rest day to explore Kosice centre – and stock up on M&Ms in Lidl….