BRATISLAVA GREEN HALF MARATHON – 21K

It may not be obvious at first sight, but Bratislava is a very green city. Many visitors only walk through the historical heart and don’t explore what’s behind the city center walls. Therefore, on this tour, I will show you some of the most popular places for local runners. We will for sure also meet a lot of them in person and we can wave ‘hi’ like we always do here.

Firstly, we will run across the SNP Bridge to the Janko Kráľ park, which is stretched out by the right bank of the river Danube. It is dated as the oldest public park in central Europe, being established in the 18th century. It is especially popular by the residents of Petržalka, the biggest district in Bratislava, who come here to have picnics and play all kinds of sports.

We will continue our river run crossing the Old Bridge, then turn towards the Eurovea promenade, popular in the summer evenings, when it’s filled with walkers, who sit on the terraces for their evening wine and dine.

We will then run through the Medical Garden, a park built as a relaxation zone for the students from the Medical Faculty of Comenius University. This park is very popular, because it’s in the city centre, so people who work nearby, often spend some time here after working hours.

The Presidential Garden is also not so well-known for tourists, as it’s not visible from the front side of the Presidential Palace. We will run through the well-preserved garden alleys and maybe also see Maria Theresa, Hungarian queen, riding a horse!

Th next part will be a little bit steeper, as we’ll be getting to the more serious green areas. No more parks and alleys, but trail paths and hills. We will run through Horsky Park, a forest arranged into a park with lots of benches and relaxing areas. It has maintained its former fauna and flora from the 17^th century, when it was built up.

Horsky Park is an intro to real wild nature, which we will get to by running to the edge of The Little Carpathian mountains. This mountain range has got an area of 820m² and it’s webbed with lots and lots of hiking and biking routes. We will only make a little teaser of what the mountains have to offer, with a short circle route around the lakes.

And we will end our green tour by coming back to the riverside and jogging by the river Danube, enjoying the view of the river, forests and castle hill.