Whenever I had visitors to Bratislava during my year of teaching there, I always felt the need to get them out of the city at some stage and show them the Slovak countryside. Without a car, the easiest way was a short train ride to Trnava, about 30 miles to the north-east. At first, my trips were just meant to show the agricultural industry so close to the city, but it soon turned out that Trnava itself was a really lovely town to visit.

It’s pretty small – not quite 70,000 people – but has historical buildings aplenty, a decent museum, and even a few good restaurants. The train station is also very close to the town centre, so making even a half-day trip there is easy and cheap. There is a main Old Town square (pictured) which is easy to find, and I recommend trying one of the restaurants there for lunch – there are not too many tourists around, but enough that some of them have translated their menus if you’re finding the Slovak language hard to understand.

Pick a sunny day if you can and try to stroll around most of the city. There are churches and a cathedral to browse in, and enough local atmosphere to make you glad you escaped the much-busier (though still not too stressful) city of Bratislava, even if it’s just for a day. All my visitors gave it the thumbs-up!

If you fancy staying a little longer in Trnava check out the best rates at local hotels.