The ladies take a tour

July 26, 2007 Tuesday

Today is the Ladies’ trip. We all gathered after breakfast in the front of the hotel. There are 6 of us on the trip. Julie – an American from Boston, Vonda – a Pole from Boston, Rilla – a Belgian from South Africa, Eleanora and Dunna – both Hungarians from Budapest. Do you get the idea that these meetings are a great variety of nationalities?

1^st we went to the the Belianska cave in the High Tatras. This involved a 20 minute hike straight uphill to the entrance. I am really impressed with Vonda. She talked nonstop all the way up. The rest of us were gasping for breath.

We all took the opportunity to visit the ladies room while Ondrej (pronounced Andre) bought the tickets. We had a short wait, because it was a very crowded day and they only allow so many people in at a time.

Ondrej explained that there were 826 steps in the cave (that’s 33 flights by my recent reckoning method!) But he hastened to assure us, it took 70 minutes and there were rest stops along the way. What he didn’t explain very well is that the 826 steps were both up and down. There were many more down steps because that route was steeper. The up route had a lot of switch back paths.

What can I say? It was a cave with all of the cave things. Pools (with coins including some floating ones), stalactites, stalagmites, rocks in the form of imaginary things – if you have been on a cave tour, you know what I’m talking about. This cave had several kinds of bats, but we didn’t see any. As far as I can tell, every cave has one large room that is referred to as a music room. This one didn’t disappoint. The music is provided by drops of water falling into a pool. The guide invited people to sing. Vonda did.

Then we walked straight down hill to the parking lot.

Next on the agenda was a drive to a farmer’s yard where we were to get the carriage ride. This being a group of women, we all used the bathroom in the farmhouse.

Over the river (on a washboard kidney rattling bridge)

And through the woods (at a pretty good clip)
To the mountain meadow we go


We saw the wooden houses which are typical of the region

When we reached the meadow, we were able to get down and take some pictures of our transport (the carriage was really a farm wagon with benches. Nice warm sheepskin to sit on (Vonda mourned the poor sheep) and a blanket which we spread over our laps because it was damn cold.) We have seen the High Tatras, the Low Tatras, the White Tatras and the Polka dotted Tatras as far as I can tell. The guides are very explict about which ones are which, but they all look the same to me.

Our estimated 4 hour tour took 6 ½ hours. I do not know why – no where on this trip were we wasting time. We did stop at a small market in the farmer’s town to buy snacks since we missed lunch.

Chuck and I went to the 3 Apostles for dinner. This is the “high end” restaurant in Levoca. I had sauerkraut soup and beef stew in a potato crepe with potato rosettes, Chuck had garlic soup and 3 meats with roasted potatoes. All plates come with the small cabbage salad. We shared a crepe with Schlag. (aka whipped cream.)

Back to the room. Chuck falls asleep immediately, because he is so tired – but still wakes up in the middle of the night.