NETHERLANDS - RIJSWIJK (DELFT POTTERY)

The second bus top was at the Delft Pottery in the suburb of Delft - Rijswijk. We saw really cute building,and after the enetring it we say just wow! It was plenty of beautiful pottery. We saw women working on that beauty. They were real excellent specialists. There is possibility to buy some pieces, but I do not remember the prices - but I am sure they are not low. All in all it was another marvellous experience!

NETHERLANDS – KLOMPENMAKERIJ RATTERMAN

In 2005 I was in Amsterdam, Netherlands for working purpose. The stay included weekend so I bought a short one day bus trip round the Netherlands. The first part of it was a visit of Amstelveen. Unfortunately, the flower auction was closed because it was Sunday. But the bus stopped in front of small cozy wooden shoes manufacture called Klompenmakerij Ratterman. There were a lot of clogs inside, even colored. The clogs are one of the characteristic things of Netherlands. The visit was quite short but interesting. One could see a craftsman making clogs, or to buy them as a souvenir. 

Are not they beauiful?

USA - KENTUCKY - MIDWAY

Today I will share my impressions from the city of Midway in Kentucky. According to the Internet it has approximately 1600 inhabitants, and according to me is very cute. Together with my fellow travelers we stopped there to have a lunch. The main street is like from a historical movie. Beautiful houses are even more beautiful when it is so sunny day than it was during our visit. The atmosphere in the city was very comfortably. The name of the city is logical – it is located right on the halfway between Lexington and Frankfort and between Georgetown and Versailles. The restaurant was also very nice (you can see it on the first picture), they had good selection of food and service was excellent. I do not know how many tourists they have during the summer holidays day (it was august 2005), but I think everybody must be satisfied. All an all I spent pleasant one or two hours in Midway. In my opinion deservedly the city is in the list of the National Register of Historic Places since 1978. I found information, that it was first railroaded city in Kentucky!

USA - KENTUCKY - WOODFORD RESERVE DISTILLERY

One of the most interesting places I have ever visited in my  life was Woodford Reserve Distillery in USA, Kentucky, close to Frankfort and Versailles (beautiful name...). It is situated in beautiful surrounding and has very pleasant atmosphere. The distillery produces one of the Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey, which is really rare. I had an opportunity to take part in a guided tour inside the distillery.

Here it is...

Entrance

Short introduction about the distillery

Entrance hall is like a small museum of the distillery

What a beautiful piece of furniture...

It is just awesome, and when it is full...

For some men it is like to be in heaven...

And these are the results of all process

All in all it was really nice experience, I will probably never forget. By the way Kentucky is beautiful and this was only one place worth to be in. I will bring also the others I visited.

SLOVAKIA - ORAVA CASTLE

Today I decided to create my own blog in a foreign language – English. The language is foreign for me, because I am from Slovakia. Yes you are right, Slovakia is in Central Europe and yes, it was a part of Czechoslovakia 20 years ago. I am a man who loves travelling and taking pictures during my trips. Unfortunately I have not enough free time to process my pictures in laptop to a nice dvd-project or something like that. So I decided to share my pictures this way, to create a blog. Some pictures are beautiful enough to stay without words; some will have my comments (sometimes serious, sometimes funny or ironical). During my 44 years long life I was in many places of the Europe, USA and little bit of Asia. I saw many interesting things which I do not want to keep only in my head. In my first article I would like to introduce you one of the most beautiful places in Slovakia – Orava Castle. Orava is a mountainous northern Slovakian region. The castle is in area of Oravsky Podzamok village and you cannot avoid it, because it is on the rock above the village. But now, just see it on my pictures, may be you will decide to visit the castle in the future, at least you will have some hints.

Location of Orava Castle

 

This is the entrance to the castle

From the beginning everything is so high, almost in a blue sky. It seems to be unreachable.

When you come to the low bailey, the other parts of the castle are even higher and higher...

At the bailey you can find also column of shame, where bad people used to be chained up for some time.

One do not want to believe, that castle is still climbing up...

There are a lot of historical things (mainly furniture, pictures, medieval weapons, etc.) in the castle, for example these clothes for women.

Typical elements of this castle - stairways.

View of Oravský Podzámok village.

View of the lower bailey. It was used (together with other parts of the castle) by many filmmakers, specially for creating fairy-tale movies.

This altar is situated inside the castle´s chapel. It looks like from marble, but it is made from wood!

Manor-house in Horná Lehota village. It is next to the raft station. It is another way how to admire Orava Castle - from the river.

Rafter is telling stories to the tourists and they are listening very carefuly. There is a place for 12 tourist and 2 rafters on the raft.

Water is calm, weather is hot, everything is ok.

Another raft full of tourists.

So, what do you think about the castle? I can only recommend you to spend some time by visiting it.