Gabcikovo lock – Danube River – Slovakia

Todd and Oana travel through the Gabcikovo lock on the Danube River.

The Gabcikovo lock is the largest lock on the Danube north of Hungary.

It’s also the only lock in Slovakia on the Danube.

We were traveling on the Avalon Illumination when we filmed this September 17th, 2017.

Locks are a way to move ships up and down rivers that would normally be un-navigable because of areas of steep and shallow depths.  By installing locks, rivers can be made to be level, even though some rivers go from sea level to 1,400 meters (4,200 feet) in elevation.  The locks are a way to raise and lower ships to the next segment of the river.

There were numerous ships in the lock.  Our ship, the Avalon Illumination, was over 100M long and 10M wide.  There were much larger ships in this lock with us.  It could have held between 4-6 ships like ours.

The lock is 275 meters long and 34 meters wide.  It is part of the Gabcikovo-Nagymaros Dams complex.