Bratislava, Slovakia – Host city of Women’s EHF EURO 2026

Bratislava’s Old Town is small enough to cross in twenty minutes and dense enough to fill a day: Michael’s Gate, the last of the medieval city gates; St Martin’s Cathedral, the coronation church of Hungarian kings and queens between 1563 and 1830.

Pastel palaces, narrow lanes and a bronze man peering out of a manhole. Above it all sits Bratislava Castle, its terraces looking out over the Danube.

The UFO observation deck sits on top of the SNP Bridge — a 1970s landmark that looks like a flying saucer parked above the Danube.

From 95 metres up you get the entire city at once: the castle, the river, the Small Carpathian hills, and on a clear day the Austrian and Hungarian borders, both less than 20 kilometres away.

Slovakia’s oldest wine region starts where the city ends. Vineyards climb the Small Carpathians in Rača, Svätý Jur and Pezinok, all reachable by local train or bus in under an hour, and the small family cellars pour Grüner Veltliner, Riesling and Blaufränkisch. If you’d rather stay in town, the same bottles turn up in the wine bars around the Old Town.

Ten kilometres upstream, ruined walls stand on a cliff where the Morava river meets the Danube. People have fortified this rock since the Stone Age.

Napoleon’s troops blew it up in 1809. For forty years it also marked the edge of the Iron Curtain. The Gate of Freedom memorial below the castle remembers those who died trying to cross the river west.

The tournament falls in the middle of the Christmas market season. Main Square and Hviezdoslav Square fill with wooden stalls, a tree and the smell of mulled wine and honey mead.

Try lokše (thin potato pancakes served with duck fat or poppy seed) and cabbage soup. The markets run daily until late evening, a few minutes’ walk from anywhere in the centre.