Difficult Destination – The Journey To Uzhhorod (The Lost Cities #4)

There comes a time when I am developing a travel itinerary that fear takes hold and threatens to stop me from visiting the one place that is integral to the whole plan. In this case, that place happens to be Uzhhorod. That small city on the southwestern edge of Ukraine, a stone’s throw from Slovakia, and within a short drive of Hungary is my challenge, my obstacle, and my opportunity. The lost cities itinerary I have spent the past several days developing is now dependent upon an obscure city that kingdoms, empires, and nations have inherited, but never really knew what to do with it.

Uzhhorod is an outlier. Look no further than the fact that its location has helped it escape the worst of a horrific war. Uzhhorod is as hard to grasp as it is to access. A city that I have previously avoided because I did not have the time nor the energy to visit it, a city that has the most multiple personalities in its disorders, a city whose history is a mixed-up mumble jumble of ethnicities, languages, nationalities, and cultures that it defies logic. A city that adds another layer of complexity to my lost cities beyond the Hungarian border project. A city that has been lost to every entity that has tried to claim it since the turn of the 20^th century. A city that represents a place not only on the map, but inside of me. And now Uzhhorod has come back to baffle me.

Palatial transport – Uzhhorod Railway Station (Credit: Elke Wetzig)

Magical Thinking – Tendencies To Avoidance
Buses, I hate them. Border officials, I fear them. Transfers at train stations, I loathe them. These are the barriers that are causing me consternation as I try to find the best way to Uzhhorod. This should not bother me as much as it does. I love challenges. I am not so sure I love multiple challenges. Kosice to Uzhhorod is not an easy journey, even if there was no war going on in Ukraine. No trains travel there directly. The best routes I have found are indirect ones which require confusing acts of avoidance followed by unavoidable obstacles. My first mistake was to assume I could somehow make this journey easy on myself. Easy would mean straightforward. In the best of all worlds, I would find a train (always my preferred method of travel) from Kosice to the border. Then I could take a quick transfer by taxi into Uzhhorod. I discovered that is impossible.

That did not keep me from descending into the realm of magical thinking with a train taking me straight from Kosice to Uzhhorod. Never mind the different railway gauges, never mind border control, never mind the war going on, never mind reality, never mind that in these war-torn times almost everyone is heading in the opposite direction. My absurd railway fantasies were stillborn not long after they were first formulated. And still I kept thinking this should be so easy. Two major regional cities, Kosice and Uzhhorod, not very far apart, should somehow be connected. What I failed to take into consideration was that nothing had been easy here since the start of World War I had been through endless upheavals. The tumultuous times have occurred with such frequency that it is almost as though they have been institutionalized.

Made for waiting – Cierna nad Tisou Railway Station (Credit: Matijak)

Taking Sides – On The Brink
After being brought to the brink of depression by the lack of a straight shot between Kosice and Uzhhorod, I decided on the most sensible course of action. I would do whatever it takes to get there. The two travel options I found were not exactly appealing. The first was to get a bus from Kosice to the Slovakia-Ukraine border. That sounded rather simple, until I learned that it took four hours and ten minutes to cover less than one hundred kilometers. I did not even bother exploring that one further because all I could imagine was a rickety bus, belching out diesel fumes, while trying to dodge planet sized potholes That might sound like an exaggeration, but no more of an exaggeration than a bus traveling an average speed of 50 kilometers per hour all the way from Kosice to Uzhhorod.

The most difficult destinations to access are often the most rewarding. By that standard, Uzhhorod should be positively sensational, though at this point I am having my doubts. I will be thrilled if I can get there in the least stressful and most straightforward manner possible. I did manage to find a way of avoiding buses, but there is going to be no way of getting around border control. The journey will consist of first taking a train from Kosice to Cierna nad Tisou. I found the name of the latter more wonderful than the idea of changing trains there. From Cierna nad Tisou, I will take another train onward to Chop, which is where the official border crossing into Ukraine is located. Chop, as a name, always sounds so strange to me. I know from experience that the name is nothing to laugh at because the border officials there are very serious. I have spent many hours at rail sidings in Chop while train cars were modified for a different railway gauge. This was a small price to pay for a journey to Lviv in western Ukraine.

A beautiful past – Postcard of Ungvar (Uzhhorod) during the Austro-Hungarian Empire (Credit: Old Ungvar)

Obstacle Course – Waiting On The Border
At Chop, there will be a second train transfer for the trip onward to Uzhhorod. The only thing more difficult than this minor odyssey will be plotting my next route into Romania. Three lost cities – Kosice, Uzhhorod, and Oradea – in succession, each of which are in different countries. Most things in the lives of Eastern Europeans have gotten easier since the Iron Curtain collapsed, travel is not one of them. Neighbors in this neck of the woods are not very neighborly when it comes to crossing borders. Traveling from Slovakia to Ukraine and Ukraine to Romania still requires passing through tight border control. I wish that the situation was different, but it is not likely to change for the better until the ongoing Ukraine-Russia War is resolved. That resolution keeps getting pushed ever deeper into the future. That means longer waits for anyone hoping to visit the lost cities.

Click here for: Time Management – A Race Against The Clock To Oradea (The Lost Cities #5)

Eastern Questions – Plotting Paths To Kosice & Uzhhorod (The Lost Cities #3)

Budapest, Vienna, and Prague. Those three cities are as far eastward in Europe as most foreign visitors are likely to get. An argument can be made that none of those cities are even in Eastern Europe. Vienna and Prague see themselves as part of Central Europe. Budapest is close to the midpoint of Europe. As for Eastern Europe, it starts somewhere beyond those three cities. For purposes of my journey to the lost cities of Hungary, Eastern Europe could be said to start the moment I leave Bratislava and head eastward into the heart of Slovakia. This is a land little known to westerners, but of endless fascination for those who dare to visit it. Even from an armchair halfway across the world, I feel my pulse begin to quicken as I plan a journey into a remote and fundamentally different region of Eastern Europe. Whereas Vienna, Prague, and Budapest seem to enjoy being perpetually preserved in the past. The lost cities next on my itinerary have never been able to escape it.

The old and the new – Kosice (Credit: Draco)

Internal Affairs – Getting To Kosice
I find it strange to think that Bratislava and Kosice, the two cities which dominate the western and eastern halves of Slovakia today, were officially known as Pozsony and Kassa not so long ago. Other than Transylvania, Bratislava and Kosice were the greatest losses suffered by Hungary in the post-World War I Treaty of Trianon. Pozsony had become the coronation capital for Hungarian kings after the Ottoman Turks occupied much of Hungary, Kassa was home to one of the most magnificent cathedrals in Europe that housed the tomb of Ferenc Rakoczi, who led Hungary’s war of independence in the early 18^th century. As I continue to plan my itinerary for the seven lost cities found just beyond the current border of Hungary, Bratislava and Kosice loom the largest. Because of their importance, they have ample rail connections. For example, Bratislava is just an hour and 14 minutes by train from the previous stop at Eisenstadt in eastern Austria. Best of all, I can sidestep Vienna on that short journey. I would much rather see the countryside of the Burgenland (formerly West Hungary) than pass through the busy railway stations and urban sprawl of Vienna. 

Traveling onward from Bratislava to Kosice will be more time consuming due to the distance between Slovakia’s two largest cities. The average train journey between them takes five and a half hours. This raises an interesting point. The only time I traveled to Kosice was over a decade ago on a same day round trip from Budapest. That journey took three and a half hours. This is an hour and a half faster than the journey between Bratislava and Kosice. The railway network in Hungary was created with Budapest as its main hub. Long before Kosice was connected to Bratislava, the city’s first railway connection opened in 1860 via Miskolc, in what is today northern Hungary. The line I took on my first trip to Kosice followed this same route. The difference is that it now crosses the Hungary-Slovakia border.

Fortunately, there is no longer a delay for border control between Hungary and Slovakia since both are members of the European Union and Schengen Zone. The border still exists, waiting to cross it does not. It is also interesting to note that I could take a train from Bratislava to Budapest and then Budapest to Kosice in just over six hours, not including time to switch trains. That is not much longer than it takes to travel directly from Bratislava to Kosice. The reason for this goes back to the Austro-Hungarian Empire where railway lines that ran to, through or from Budapest were given top priority. Travel from Pozsony (Bratislava) to Kassa (Kosice) prior to World War was between two provincial cities. Nevertheless, I prefer a non-stop train from Bratislava to Kosice. This will allow me to see the countryside of central Slovakia, always a delight in a country known for its splendid nature.

Point of arrival – Postcard of Kosice Railway station in the 1920’s

Isolationism – Neither Here Nor There
The next lost city on my itinerary after Kosice is an outlier that will make the journey more difficult and fascinating. Uzhhorod is not on the Eastern European travel circuit. When it was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Uzhhorod was known by its Hungarian name of Ungvar.  The city was then, as it is today, a geographical oddity, located in a neither here nor there netherworld. Uzhhorod is on the southwestern edge of Ukraine. The Carpathian Mountains separate it from the rest of the country. This has made it a safe haven during the Ukraine-Russia War. Uzhhorod has little strategic military value. The city has changed hands from Austria-Hungary to Czechoslovakia to the Soviet Union to Ukraine since World War I. And yet it remains as isolated as ever.

Uzhhorod is not far from Ukraine’s borders with Slovakia and Hungary. Historically, the city has more in common with Hungary and Slovakia than it does Ukraine. That should make it easier to access, but it doesn’t. The Ukrainian border is where the European Union comes to an end. This makes crossing over it more difficult. An added issue is that Ukraine uses a different railway gauge then its western neighbors. For those who choose to ride the rails, this means getting off one train and boarding another or waiting for a couple of hours as the train’s undercarriage is switched to fit the narrower gauge rails. There is the additional complicating factor of the Ukraine-Russia War.

Object of desire – Uzhhorod (Credit: Ekaterina Polischuk)

Going Nowhere – Challenge & Opportunity
Getting to Uzhhorod from Kosice will not be easy. Nothing worth doing ever is. I have never been there before, mainly because it is on the way to nowhere. This makes Uzhhorod the quintessential lost city. In the past, I could never really make it part of a multi-stop journey. I imagined it as a one-off, the end of a line that I either bypassed or avoided. An obscure destination that I could not fit into an existing journey. That is no longer true. My goal of visiting the lost cities of Hungary means that I must visit Uzhhorod. The only problem is the best way to get there. That is the challenge. It is also an opportunity.

Click here for: Difficult Destination – The Journey To Uzhhorod (The Lost Cities #4)

Retro Rail Ride – From Budapest to Eisenstadt & Bratislava (The Lost Cities #2)

The borders changed, the bureaucrats changed, the demographics changed, the economies changed, the politics changed, the names changed, the official languages changed, the centuries changed and still Budapest remains, as it did at the turn of the 20th century, the hub for anyone looking to reach the lost cities just beyond the borders of Hungary. In the last half of the 19^th century, Hungarian National Railway’s network of lines was developed with Budapest as the epicenter. That remains largely true today for the cities which were once part of the Kingdom of Hungary. The old cliché “the more things change, the more they stay the same” still applies in this case. Those traveling to the lost cities are likely to find themselves starting in Budapest. That is where my own journey to the lost cities now begins.

Ready to roll – Dawn at Budapest Nyugati (Western Railway Station)

Border Complications – National Insecurities
The shortest distance between two points is said to be a straight line. The shortest distance between the early 20^th century and the lost cities of Oradea (Nagyvarad), Timisoara (Temesvar), Subotica (Szabadka), Pozsony (Bratislava), Kosice (Kaschau), Eisenstadt (Kismarton), and Ungvar (Uzhhorod) is at the three railway stations (Nyugati – western/Keleti – eastern/Deli – southern) in Budapest. Many things have changed, and some stayed the same since the early 20^th century regarding the lost cities. Rail connections are one of them. While Budapest is still the best place to begin any journey to all seven lost cities, national borders cause complications. These are a legacy from the aftermath of World War I when border control inhibited pre-existing rail routes. It took 84 years, accession to the European Union and Schengen Zone for borderless travel between Hungary, Austria and Slovakia. This is also slated to happen with Romania when it becomes part of the Schengen Zone in 2024. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for Serbia and Ukraine. Borders are always complicating factors, the ones between Hungary and its neighbors still act as irritants for the traveler. The situation has improved, but it is still an obstacle the traveler must have overcome.

The complications of borders were expected after the Treaty of Trianon went into effect on June 4, 1920. The nations which had gained the lost cities were suspicious of Hungary’s future intentions toward them. Even with large numbers of Hungarians migrating out of the lost cities and into the newly constituted Republic of Hungary, there were still large numbers of Hungarians that were the cause of consternation for Romania (formed in 1866), Yugoslavia (formed in 1918), and Czechoslovakia (formed in 1918), Austria was a different matter altogether, but it too eyed Hungary warily. Better to make travel between these nations and Hungary more difficult. Borders were a form of security. Judging by the coming of another world war, they were not a very good one.

Awaiting arrivals – Eisenstadt Railway Station

Living On The Edge – Burgenland & Bratislava
As any traveler does before setting out on a journey, I am searching for the best route between my destinations. It makes sense to start in Budapest since it was the transport hub for the Hungarian half (Transleithania) of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. From Budapest, the question is where to go first. That decision will go a long way in determining the route I will take to travel from one city to the next. I am not looking for the quickest route between the lost cities. I am searching for the one that will prove most intellectually satisfying. One of the most important elements of any journey is getting off to a good start. That might sound simplistic, but when it comes to travel my experience has been that the beginning of a journey van either set the traveler up for success or failure. With that in mind, I want to ease into this journey. Looking at the seven lost cities, Eisenstadt in Eastern Austria stands out as low hanging fruit ripe to be plucked with a leisurely rail ride.

Due to the starting and final destinations for this initial leg of the journey being in different countries, it will require multiple transfers and take almost four hours. I can think of worse things than riding the rails across western Hungary and then hopscotching between a couple of stations before arrival in the Austrian province of Burgenland. It only seems right that I should finish this first leg of the journey in what became a newly created ninth Austrian province in 1921. Along the way I will be passing through Sopron, known as the most loyal city in Hungary because it voted to stay part of the country during the messy aftermath of the post- World War I treaty making process.

Eisenstadt is a good first lost city to visit for logistical reasons. Of the seven lost cities, it is the furthest one to the west and in near proximity to Bratislava, which will be second on my itinerary.   Bratislava, known by Hungarians as Pozsony, has done better economically than any of the other lost cities. The reason can be summed up as location and size. Bratislava is just 30 kilometers from Vienna. It has become something of a bedroom community to the Austrian capital. Bratislava also became the capital of Slovakia in 1994. As the seat of government, the city had a self-reinforcing economy. Due to Slovakia’s lower taxes and cost of living (not the case anymore), businesses and people poured into the city. It was the largest city in the newly created country.  Bratislava continues its impressive growth today. The city’s Old Town is spectacular, and the surrounding area has much to recommend it.

Power & prosperity – Bratislava (Credit: Jorge Franganillo)

Lost & Found – The Eastern Frontier
From Bratislava I really have only one choice, head eastward. This is the direction that has captivated me ever since I first set foot in the region. As much as I love Budapest and Bratislava, nothing fires my imagination like heading ever deeper into Eastern Europe. This is the true heart of a region that has been greatly misunderstood by the western world. It is also a region that the Treaty of Trianon upended to a greater extent than anywhere else. The heartlands of historic Hungary can still be found in eastern Slovakia, sub-Carpathian Ukraine, and western Romania. These places are home to the lost cities that are the next stage in planning my itinerary.

Click here for: Eastern Questions – Plotting Paths To Kosice & Uzhhorod (The Lost Cities #3)