Ovčí Syr Stands

Ovčí syr means, literally, "sheep cheese." Signs litter the roadsides of Slovakia, particularly in the mountains, with nothing but these two words. The rest of the products sold at ovčí syr stands are only implied - there is often "žinčica" (a sheep's-milk whey drink) and sometimes frozen fish or even vegetables - but not promised. These aren't grocers, they are cheese mongers, and they don't pay much attention to anything else. Above is one of the more modern and product-rich ovčí syr shops that we've been in. The display cases and selection were unexpected and impressive.
The whole thing was squeezed into this little, wooden cabin next to a winding road near Levoca. This type of market feels like a holdover from earlier days, when travelers on popular routes needed a quick bite of cheese on their way from place to place. It's rare to see ovčí syr places in towns or cities, though they do exist. Usually they are on the outskirts, near roads and passing cars and - most importantly - the animals themselves. When we pulled in, a boy on a bicycle stopped by to ride in circles near our car, staring at the license plate.
The smoked "oštiepok" that we bought there was imprinted with the Slovak coat of arms, but this type of cheese is pressed into myriad molds. There are more traditional designs shaped into simple balls, a popular subset of easter egg patterns and some oštiepok are sold in cutesy little-lamb forms. It has a strong smokey flavor and aroma, without much room left over on the tongue for the taste of cheese. It's bouncy and makes an audible squeaking noise in the teeth, which is fun but unsettling.A more representative stand, with it's own flock attending closely in the meadows behind, was this little hut. Nestled in a pothole-ridden pull-off, it was popular and staffed by a disinterested woman. The guy before us in line began drinking his žinčica before he'd even paid.
We bought two different types of uniquely Slovak cheese there: "korbáčiky" (which means "little whip") and "parenica." The parenica is the one that looks like rolled bacon, and is a smoked and steamed cheese that's tough and almost fibrous in texture. It's not bad, but the taste is more akin to cured meat than to dairy. The korbáčiky is a softer and more cheesy type. It's greatest quality, of course, is the novelty of the consumption process. It's strange to untie a cheese and untangle individual strands.

Ovčí syr signs are comforting. They are a reminder that not everything in Europe has been homogenized and that the ubiquitous Tesco, Billa and Lidl supermarkets haven't completely cornered the market on groceries. If there is a romantic image of the Slovak Tatras, it is of the mountain shepherd standing beside his flock. A Slovak man about my age recently asked me if coming to Slovakia was like "stepping back a hundred years." I told him that no, it wasn't. Our campsite has fast wi-fi, people watched the NBA finals, radios play a mix of Katy Perry and "Born This Way," Japanese-fusion cuisine is available.

Really, I should have agreed with him a little more. Sheep cheese stands don't exist like this in America. Perhaps they exist, but they aren't normalized. Men don't step out of their trucks to visit with a local shepherd and buy a package of fresh bryndza. The past feels closer at ovčí syr shops because they are a continuation of an unbroken tradition. Even if there are big plastic signs now, beckoning people in from motorways, and even if the cheese is refrigerated and sealed in plastic, there are still shepherds in these mountains that make a living selling their cheese on roadsides.

A Very Cool Place, Indeed

I have to admit that since my last post was about our Sucha Bela gorge excursion, I'm feeling sort of like a comic book author. Next up on the Adventures of Merlin and Rebecca: The pair travel inside an ice cave! It's true, though. We did. Digging out the few cold-weather holdovers in our car, we bundled up and visited one of the most important ice caves in the world at Dobšinská.
It was instantly cold and not as far underground as I was expecting. In fact, just a few steps down there was already a coating of ice all around us. The combination of rock and ice crystals made me feel like Polly Pocket, if Polly Pocket lived inside of a geode. I was able to have such inane musings, because the tour was conducted in Slovak and there were no information panels or pamphlets. (Other brilliant observations: it was like a scene from an epic battle between Batman and Mister Freeze). It's not such a bad thing in situations like this, I think, to be left to your own mental devices. The experience is completely sensory while you're there and then you can research what the heck you were looking at online afterwards.
It was amazing to imagine digging this walkway out. Sometimes, we can't help but wonder how people had the audacity to put something so precious at risk for the sake of tourism. However, the cave has been doing just fine since its discovery by miners in 1870 and subsequent opening to the public just a year later. In 1887, it became the very first electrically lit cave in all of Europe. I'm sure a huge amount of its preservation comes from the switch to a non-heating light source.
There are elements of the Slovak language we've come to understand, namely menu items and numbers. We eat out and pay for things a lot. Anyway, the guide pointed to this wall of ice and said 250,000. That happens to be the estimation of the cave's age, so I can only assume that he was pointing out the lines in this wall covering as indicative of that fact. Sort of like tree rings. Before it was officially "discovered," local shepherds and hunters referred to it as "the cold hole."
Apparently, an Olympic figure skater did a short display in the cave in the 1950s, to draw attention to the natural wonder. I'm guessing it took place here, in the largest, flattest space we visited. On each side of the 'rink,' the ice billowed up into rolling waves. My idea of what the surfaces looked like kept changing: foamed tidal tips, hoar frost on firs, enormous melted candles. The age gives the blue and white covering all sorts of wonderful texture.
The centerpiece ice hall reminded me of a cave diorama with stalagmites and stalactites made of blown glass, beautiful in its brilliant translucence. The iron deposits conjured images of a rusty gutter, surrounded by icicles, all hanging from a snow covered garage. Not soon after, the tour abruptly ended. Only about a third of the Dobšinská ice cave is open to the public and it took us all of a half hour to walk through. We emerged thinking, "What an awesome place!" and "So, what the heck forms an ice cave?" In Dobšinská's case, its a sort of cold trap. During the winter, cold air travels in and the warm air rises out of the cave. All full up with cold, the lighter hot air of summer has no room to eek its way in. Thus, the cave maintains a pretty steady temperature of 0°C.

What a sad irony when we still couldn't find any ice to fill our cooler that evening.

Slovak Food

Rebecca made the astute observation that Slovak food isn’t all that much different from other heavy, mitteleuropean cuisines – but that it seems nicer because it’s dressed up a little. Though the table may groan beneath the weight of “bryndzové halušky” - Slovakia’s national dish - one can’t grumble about the presentation. It’s amazing how far a few ringlets of scallion and a carrot flower can go in the direction of prettiness.
“Halušky” are little potato flour dumplings, similar to gnocchi. Here, in the common fashion of ovine-mad Slovak chefs, they are drenched in melted sheep’s cheese and topped with bits of crisped pork fat. Bryndza is the type of sour, soft cheese that gets used and gives the dish its name. It’s a dense plate of food, and one encounter was enough to feel well acquainted with it. Certainly a pleasure, but I doubt we’ll meet again.
There are several kinds of “guláš” (goulash) in Slovak cuisine. Some are quite familiar, some are less so. This is a cabbage and gravy variety called “gulášová polievka” with some braised cut of beef swimming around in it. The accompanying “knedle” is a popular starch for soaking up things like this – boiled flour loaves that have little flavor and a spongy texture, they are extremely absorbent.
A guláš that looked more familiar, this paprika and “ram’s meat” stew was served in a little cauldron and was studded with small, toothsome noodles and new potatoes. It had a generous amount of spice, but paprika is by nature very gentle. The meat was tender and globs of melting fat clung between chunks of tissue. The name for this particular dish is “kotlíkový guláš,” a variant that takes its name from the kind of pot and that is often cooked outside over an open fire – though we have only seen it prepared that way in beer advertisements. I ate it on the packed porch of a “salas” eatery near Spiš castle – salas are simple, traditional places that tend to specialize in sheep products. The word means “shepherd’s farm,” so they are destined to be a little tacky and touristy in modernity.
There is virtually no cheese in Slovakia other than sheep cheese, and it comes in a huge number of forms. Smoked, semi-hard cheeses are popular, as are softer, farmer’s types – like the one that has been mixed with paprika on the right. Often, it makes up the only protein in a dish, and one can buy it on the roadside in little ovčí syr stands.
“Pirohy” are very similar to their polish “pierogi” cousins, and are treated in the same, greasy way as halušky. These were served at an outdoor, dusty table on the outskirts of a Roma village – part of a lunch with a bowl of soup that cost three euros. A creamy potato filling was lighter than I expected, and the sour cream on top was more flavorful and oily than typical types.
Oil-slicked, paprika-stained “rezancová polievka,” or chicken soup, is a central Slovak specialty that has a deeper flavor and a heartier broth than its American counterpart. Soups in Slovakia tend to be treated more like stews than broths, and are often served as a complete meal with a few massive slices of bread.

The food of this country is very much like this - simple and rich, but with a flavorful vein that sets it slightly apart from the Ukrainian, Polish and Germanic foods that weigh down the south, east and west. Crossing the mountains from the Czech Republic, the culinary landscape tilts toward the south and Hungary. The higher ground is more the domain of the sheep, too, which sets Slovakia apart from the mundane pork plains. It may only be a hint of spice here and there, but it's a promising, welcome tang.

Suchá Belá

Hindsight doesn't always have its cliched eagle eye vision. Only twenty-four hours after completing our hike up Suchá Belá gorge, I began to think of an angle for this blog post. Well, it sorta felt like an obstacle course more than the natural wonder I was expecting. But then I looked at our pictures. Sometimes, I think my memory downplays cool experiences in order to make sure I keep searching out new ones. Sure, we scrambled across horizontal ladders set above rushing water and climbed up cliff faces on a veritable adult jungle gym, but it all gave us an opportunity to explore an otherwise inaccessible terrain that was truly beautiful.
We were almost scared off from the hike by a tourism brochure that lauded its 30meter high ladder and final walkway, which becomes completely submerged when the water is high. You see, between the two of us, we've got one fear of slipping on wet surfaces and one fear of heights. Neither are crippling, nor do they stop us from many activities. We just, you know, don't prefer them. Our decision was made, though, when the campsite receptionist waved at us and said "You going to Suchá Belá? Have fun!" Okay, he thinks we can do it. An out of shape father and his two small children joined us on the walkway to the trailhead. If they can do it. Off we went!
Fallen limestone and pines, the casualties of century old weathering, lay all around the trail. Some areas were bone dry, others necessitated skipping across stones in shallow ponds. In those situations, I find it best to just get your feet wet off the bat. That way, falling off a stone into the water loses its scariness. My hiking shoes were sopping wet only minutes into the trail on purpose. I promise.
The network of ladders and steps were first put into place in 1908, then available only to researchers. They were opened to the public in 1957 and are now traversed by more tourists than any other trail in Slovenský Raj Národný Park (Slovak Paradise National Park). Apparently, some elements were added for "playfulness," like these logs, set up to prevent the canyon from closing up. Whenever we reached a particularly dicey walkway with steps just a little too far apart, we would blame the playfulness.
Here's the fearsome 30 meter high ladder. The previous series of steps definitely reached up higher, but were not as straight and steep. I enjoyed having something more solid to hold on to than a chain. This was just one of the many waterfalls we walked up alongside. Passing by some people and letting others go ahead, we found ourselves with a rare moment of aloneness. It was perfect timing to really take in the simplicity of the path ahead and the amazing situations we find ourselves in.
Up, up, up, we went around a series of plunge pools that are said to resemble a set of plates. "Misore," this fall's name, actually translates to "Dishes." Even in the cool shade of surrounding pines, we wished we could take a dip. We've made it our habit to carry bathing suits everywhere we go. Wishful thinking, really, but they're very light. This section of the trail was the prettiest and made me feel very fortunate to be there in mid-June. Any later in the tourist season and I doubt I would have had time to stop and look down.
There's never a sign at the end that says, "You did it!" which often makes completing something like this anticlimactic. As the trail widened and led into a flat wooded area, we realized we were about to begin our journey back down. Suchá Belá is one-way only, obviously, and the hike back home was just a simple dirt walkway. We sat on a newly cut log to have our lunch of smoked sprats and bread. Then, we continued on past a logger and his draft horse, toward our campsite.

Slovakia's Second City

Košice is the second city of Slovakia, a big sprawl of cement blocks rising in the rust-colored, iron-mining east of the country - on Ukaine’s doorstep and about five hours drive from the Czech border. In our time traveling in Slovakia, we’ve skirted the capital and headed further inward, deciding to leave Bratislava’s charm for another time. Approaching Košice, feeling that industry and communism had perhaps created a cubist wasteland in utter isolation, it seemed that it might have been nice to spend some time in a more cosmopolitan place. Later that night, after eating well and drinking very well, the old town was magical and we felt that the city was an oasis.
There is plenty to see in Košice, and the architecture that has survived at the heart of town is stunning. (By the way, Košice is pronounced “koh-sheets-eh”) Renaissance facades have been mixed with medieval stone buildings along the square, and the Hungarian empire’s stability – along with the town’s provincial location – allowed the buildings to be exceptionally well preserved. The cathedral of Saint Elizabeth is one of the easternmost gothic cathedrals in Europe and one of the grandest for hundreds of miles. Nearby, the older St. Michael’s chapel (dating from the 14th century), is less imposing but perhaps better attended at Sunday mass.
There is a liveliness in Košice that was refreshing. Even on a Sunday afternoon, when most European cities feel desolate, there were locals out and about, sitting at cafes and drinking in side-street bars. There aren’t many tourists, and those that are around seem content to sit at sunny tables and revel in the unhurried energy of the place. It signaled something to us about the changing of the seasons.
Finding restaurants with a more au-courant approach to food is always a joy. Appearing in the wilderness, where they’re least expected, they seem a miracle. The lushness of the dining scene might be sparse compared with more western cities, but there is nowhere nearby, that I know of, where one can find a simple plate of smoked salmon, or pans of paella served with decent Spanish wine. We even had expertly made cocktails – the bartender didn’t blink when I ordered a gin martini (not on the menu). She mixed it deftly and carefully, straining out the last remnants of ice and serving it in a chilled glass. What a pleasure! It’s difficult, actually, to find a better made drink in New York, and I have never seen anyone as adept as she in Europe.
There are certainly a good number of “herna” bars (read: “slot machine joints”) and strip clubs, but there is a thriving bar scene with a more relaxed feel – places where people go for conversation and camaraderie. Walking on the square it was suddenly apparent that summer had showed up. The pace and the light of the later hours had none of the inward looking, shelter seeking aspects of colder times. The common desire was for the outdoors and for calm, neutrally cool air.
As we headed towards home one such evening, we were struck by how exotic a city can feel on a warm night in Europe. A throng of revelers had just been let out of the cathedral after a musical event, and the square was busy with people saying goodbyes and greeting each other in the darkness. The bell towers loomed overhead and the scene seemed very ancient. It isn’t always immediately present in our mind, how old and very European everything is around us, and sometimes we are struck by a wave of awe – almost an emotional response.
As we drove eastward towards Košice - and into territory that was familiar to us from earlier, less sunny times - we expected a return to backwaters and barrenness. The city was a compromise, a destination that seemed both inevitable and necessary for our experience of Slovakia without Bratislava. It turned out that it was, indeed, representative. Instead of bleakness and hardscrabble blocks, though, it was a joy, a place that felt unique and itself.

Why Don't They Have This in America?

At the Košice Technicke Muzeum we spotted this sink. Okay, normal sink, but look above it! The soap was hung up in a plastic net, so that you could rub your hands on it, but it wouldn't have to sit in a wet pool of residue. Brilliant.

All the World's a Summerstage

Summer brings out the exhibitionist in everyone. Whether its shirtless Joe, hot pants Jan or the impromptu girl group screaming NKOTBSB's collective greatest hits after too many PBRs, the whole world is just ready to perform, following the flowers lead. The heat expands the air like a curtain opening on one big stage.
In Košice, a musical fountain spurts climactically along with Celine Dion's high notes and lights the water in neon as Frank Sinatra croons about another city half a world away. It's odd and corny and the waterworks and soundtrack aren't always expertly linked, but the locals love it. Kids dare each other to run in, wedding portraits are taken in front of it, teens use it as a meeting point to just start their night.
When we arrived, the Summer Music Fest was going on. A mix gendered dance group called "Pastels Fashion Show" took the stage to a roar of screaming girls, which we soon realized was just part of their backing track. The outdoor cafe's were full and tweens rushed toward the stage, brimming with excitement for the next act, a ska-ish band called "Billy Barman" with a bouffant haired lead singer and tight-panted bespectacled guitarist.
After the stage was packed up and the official schedule of events had been completed, the town - amazingly - didn't change all that much. The following afternoon welcomed just as many outdoor coffee and beer drinkers, just as much general bustle. The sound of a Spanish guitar lured us to a tapas restaurant where couples twirled each other around, salsa dancing. We watched from inside, where we dined on paella alone. No one sat inside in Košice, and barely anyone ordered food. It was all about being out and about, fitting as many people around a table as possible and nursing a beverage until the sun went down. When summer daylight is your spotlight, the show can go on for at least three acts.
Even the aforementioned shirtless Joe contributed to the city's musicality, ruining at least a dozen wedding portraits on his way. His two friends trailed on bicycles, shaking their heads and laughing at his audacity - following him just the same.

Simple Pleasures of the Provincial Museum

Outside of the capitols and major western cities, in sleepy towns with strange names, some of the most interesting things lie tucked away in abandoned, dusty rooms. Visiting museums in places like Košice, in the iron-mining east of Slovakia, the experience is as much about the feeling of being alone amongst a forgotten trove as it is about the things displayed there. We visited two interesting museums here - the East Slovakia Museum and the Košice Technicke Muzeum - and were practically the only people in either place.
The buildings themselves are disused enough to have become museums - old mansions and institutional buildings that have outlived their owners and function and survive because of volunteers and a pittance from the city. Locals never bother to visit and there aren't enough tourists to fill them up, but the collections need a home and can't be thrown out. In these places there is always a pervasive sense of basic maintenance and emptiness - the smells of mildew, floorwax and decay, the glare of fluorescent lights, the creak of ancient parquet, white walls hung with poorly-printed placards. Often, we have to fumble around for a lightswitch or guess at the direction to take. I love the old hallways, padded with drab carpeting and strung with poorly done electrical wiring. Also, the old ladies who sit quietly in corners, dozing or scratching at crosswords, keeping an eye on things as we move through the hushed rooms.
There is sense, in places like this, that the items are being displayed less than they are being held on to. In an awkwardly located corner of the East Slovakia Museum, the interior of an old apothecary had been preserved, with rows of narrow drawers and a marble countertop. Another room was bright with folk arts and Slovak weavings draped between dressed up, faceless mannequins. Neither exhibit was especially impressive, despite feeling the most cohesive and planned - there are similar collections in scads of museums in many countries.
The bulk of the collection was more impressive, but was also more haphazardly set up. A woman unlocked a door at the top of a staircase (we were accompanied by an old man and a younger fellow who spoke Slovak, but had nearly accentless English when he talked to us) and let us into the first of many rooms. Košice has a long and rich history, and the regional woodcarving artisans were renowned throughout central Europe during the middle ages. Carvings and paintings from the 13th through the 17th century were set up in long, crowded halls. The pieces were lit harshly and looked pretty bad against smudged white paint - but were still impressive and intricate. The fragility of wood as organic matter seems to convey the gravity of the centuries more heavily than works in stone.
The technical museum was actually one of the more interesting places I've been to on this trip - despite infrequent English translation and the somewhat ramshackle displays. A huge collection of radios - some antique and some simply dusty - was set out on pieces of plywood. Here, there were rooms devoted to seemingly every obsolete appliance and gadget, all of them jumbled up and set out en mass.
Three rooms dedicated to typewriters took up a big chunk of the creaky third floor. I would guess that they had close to one hundred and fifty examples in the exhibit. It's hard to imagine any museum in any city having more typewriters than Košice does, and it's hard to fathom exactly what the impetus behind the collection would have been.
A few rooms were given over to phonographs and gramophones, a large hall was filled with surveying equipment, there was a gallery of telephones, one of microscopes and scattered display cases chock full of lightbulbs, video cameras, remote controls and calculators. The most space was given to the various equipments and tools of the area's steel industry; smelting pots and cast-iron molds abounded, set in large rooms with great wood and leather bellows. It was interesting, but overwhelming.
We were alone here, even more than in the East Slovakia Museum, and passed through some curious spaces - a sitting room, a long hall with chairs and a battered piano, stairways that curved around and let out in unexpected places. It feels like real exploring, being in places like this. We leave museums like these sensing not that we've been taught something, or that we've been presented with a well-trodden idea, but that a discovery has been made, a strange place experienced. It's one of the real joys of traveling - sensing that something important and impressive has been glimpsed, and that you alone have seen it.

I'm Not Rolling My Eyes, I'm Looking Up

I've been an accomplice to many castle hunts, providing camera lenses like scalpels and eclipsing unwanted light with my massive hair silhouette. Sometimes, Merlin worries that I'm bored by the project. Merlin worries too much. I prefer lonely ruins to fresh paint and falconry, but recent castle tours in the Czech and Slovak Republics have created a new focal point in my castle appreciation: ceilings. Bojnice Castle had me walking around with my neck craned like a Nebraskan in Times Square.

We trailed an ill-mannered youth group and their mind-bogglingly unresponsive chaperones on a tour of the palace. It was conducted in Slovak, but we were given xeroxed translations. Since we weren't able to keep the hand-outs, I can't tell you exactly how many angel heads grace this gilded ceiling. Each one of the diamonds has a cherub inside making a unique facial expression. When I went to research this on the castle's website, the only numbers I could find were the price of renting out the space for a wedding. In the mirror, you can see the group of hooligans.

The ceilings on which they cooled it a little with the gold foil were much prettier. Logically, stars and suns are a popular decorative choice. I like to think of it as the precursor to glow in the dark solar system ceiling decals. In a room full of adornments, this ceiling still stood out. Simple with just enough pizazz, I think.

But, really, the simpler the better. Some canopies featured family crests, one went a step further to paint portraits of ancestors in clouds. It made me wonder if a room like this, with just this elegant woodwork, came from a lack of funds, a disinterest in the room's function or one tasteful person's preference. Looking at the chandelier reminded me of red carpet commentaries that applaud the pairing of big, flashy earrings with subdued hair and makeup. Bad metaphor aside, it was probably my favorite ceiling in the castle.

We talk about home design a lot, probably because we're homeless. I now know that when I have a home, I want my ceilings high, wooden and waffled. Sometimes a castle hunt can be one, long interactive browse through an issue of The World of Interiors.