Hi
My three-year-old son loves trains, and I love history and nature. Fortunately, in Slovakia, there’s a place where we can combine both of our interests. That place is the Liptov Village Museum in Pribylina. So, one fine summer day, we set out on an adventure there.
My son would definitely love it if we traveled to Pribylina by train, but I chose another means of transportation. After all, we would have to combine the train journey with a bus, and with two small children, I don’t feel like transferring multiple times and relying on connections. We’re going by car. The journey takes just under an hour, and we’re there.
After buying our tickets, we enter the museum grounds. It feels as if we’ve gone back in time, finding ourselves in a Liptov village from a hundred, maybe two hundred years ago. Wooden houses surround us. Only in the middle of the village stands a larger stone building that somewhat resembles a manor. I’m curious to see what we’ll learn about this building when we go inside. At the edge of the village, a stone church stands as a guardian, overlooking everything. But let’s start from the beginning.
Each wooden house tells a different story. It’s furnished with period furniture and shows us how our ancestors once lived. The houses have small windows to prevent significant heat loss. For this reason, they also have small doors, small frames, and low ceilings.
And what does an artisan’s house look like? Let’s look inside a shoemaker’s house. We enter through a small door. In the small hallway, there’s a stove. My kids immediately grabbed the pots and pretended to cook something delicious.
Besides the hallway, there’s one other room in the house. Inside, there’s a small table, a bed, tools for shoemaking, and a collection of shoes. The shoemaker worked, ate, and slept all in the same room.
And what about that stone building? It’s a Gothic-Renaissance manor that comes from the village of Parižovce. Parižovce, like many other villages, was submerged. The Liptovská Mara dam was built in the region. Houses were disassembled and rebuilt in the open-air museum.
The manor gives us a glimpse into the life of a wealthier noble. The beautifully spacious rooms, furnished with luxurious furniture, can’t be compared to the small rooms in the wooden houses around it.
The large ceremonial hall, in my opinion, is stunning. It must have made quite an impression on guests in the past.
The stone Church of the Virgin Mary originates from the village of Liptovská Mara. That’s also the name of the dam that submerged this village. The church was dismantled and reconstructed here. The Church of the Virgin Mary was one of the most significant churches in the Liptov region. Apart from being a spiritual center, it also served as an administrative center for a long time, where the Liptov County council meetings were held.
Another building that caught my attention was this school.
Nowadays, we have a caretaker, a person who takes care of the school. In the past, this wasn’t necessary because the teacher lived right at the school. In one small room, there was a stove in the center where he would cook.
The largest room in the house had a blackboard and desks, where lessons took place.
Following the stream, we come to a watermill. It was undoubtedly one of the most important, if not the most important, buildings in the village. Grain was ground here, and thanks to it, people had flour. With it, they could bake various treats.
We leave the village and continue walking through the forest along the stream. We pass by a lake full of fish.
The highlight of the day awaits us, and it’s the historic forest railway. When my son saw the trains, he ran over to them immediately. He was unstoppable.
I watched him for a moment. It seemed like he was pretending to be the train driver, checking if all the passengers had boarded. It’s amazing, and I’m delighted to see him so happy.
There are some very nice locomotives here. My favorite is this one: a steam engine, type U46902. I’m not very knowledgeable about trains; I just noticed it ran on a narrow-gauge railway. It’s a forest railway, so it would transport items like wood through the forest.
What I love most about steam engines is the attention to detail. They’re perfectly crafted, and their design is incredibly appealing to me as a photographer. It’s a fascinating invention.
The day is coming to an end, and we must slowly head back home. The fact that it was a tiring day was evident in the car, as both kids fell asleep right away. The trip was wonderful and very educational.
Thank you.