hungary: budapest

Before and after my days in Burgas, Bulgaria, I spent a day in Budapest. Budapest has recently become a favorite of mine, so a day layover makes me happy.
As usual I took a wizzair flight from kyiv, so I landed around 0720...by this point I knew how to get into town using public transport, it was easy.
I found my hotel, but my room wasn't ready for checkin (it was only 0900 or so) so I dropped my pack and went out walking.
I saw at Stephens basilica again, I ate a giant ice cream again. I people watched again. I walked up stairs to the second floor of the central market so I could take a better photo.
I walked up castle hill and over to the back side, to find the hospital in the rock. It has been a hospital for a while, but is no longer active. The original health facility was created in naturally occurring caves in the hill. 

Over the years, people extended the caves into tunnels. The entire area is actually pretty extensive. The only way to see the hospital is on an overpriced tour, during which you don't get to take any photos. There are dioramas/wax figures/authentic objects in each room, and our guide did a good job. She explained different periods of the hospitals history, who was served at the hospital, how everything functioned. Toward the very end we got to sound the alarm that would've sounded had there ever been a nuclear attack. Thank goodness that never happened.
After the hospital I walked to the buildings on the hill that house a couple good museums. I visited one of these museums with Katie a year ago, but I hadn't been able to see the exterior of the buildings back then. Very very pretty. Not too many people around, yay for photos!

The day I spent in Budapest after Burgas was very low key. My flight landed around 1000, my hotel had my room clean when I arrived just before noon. After resting up for a short while, I changed into my bikini (with a long dress over) and started walking. I walked straight to szeschenyi baths, the same place I visited earlier in the summer.
I spent over four hours at the baths. Awesome. Totally awesome. I stayed in every pool for a while, and lived every minute of it. Sooo relaxing. I was very pickled by the time I left, I can't wait to go back again. At the end of the visit I went back through the whole thing with my camera.
Is it bad that I had a giant ice cream for dinner?
The next morning I had another early morning flight back to kyiv. I was sad to see the end of my summer travels, and of course I've already started planning next summer :)

italy: ischia

I went back to Italy for a long weekend in mid October...after the single digit temperatures in kyiv, i was boiling as I left the airport in Naples...
The next day, ken and I walked from his flat to the ferry, which took us to the island of ischia...the ferry ride was about an hour? We sat in the shade, I wasn't in the mood to end up with weird tan lines from a sunburn...
We found a taxi who took us to the hotel ken had booked, he had heard about it from a friend...the hotel is one the end of a small peninsula, very lovely...upon checking in, the hotel guy have us a quick tour and explained what we needed to know...

The island of ischia is known for it's thermal springs, this hotel has taken advantage...they have a couple thermal pools, with a man made tunnel/cave connecting everything...there is also a steam sauna, very small...one of the rooms has it's own natural jacuzzi!! There is a spa offering everything a spa normally offers, though we didn't take advantage...
there is a cafe of sorts, with appetizers available, they get all the food from their own land!!!! We had bruschetta, and a caprese salad...the mozzarella was AMAZING! We could've had dinner in the restaurant, but neither of us was that hungry...it's the kind of restaurant that has a daily menu, for a set price per person per day...the night we were there the main course was rabbit...

After floating around in the pools (perfect temperature!!!) for a while we cleaned up, then headed to the bar for snacks...not hungry enough for dinner, we did want something to chew on :)
The next morning I woke up super early...I went out on the balcony, and got to experience a beautiful sunrise...I'm not big on sunrises or sunsets (I've seen a bunch of beautiful sunrises and sunsets) but this was somehow awesome...I made sure to wake ken up too, and though he was sleepy, he found it beautiful too...
We floated around in the pools a bit more before cleaning up for breakfast...so relaxing in those pools, I could've taken a nap afterward...a very nice spread, and our table was on the edge of the cliff...beautiful :)

Our taxi took us back to the same port at which we'd arrived...after having hot chocolate at a cafe (coffee for ken) and a salad at another cafe, we discovered we were at the wrong port to catch a ferry back to where we wanted to go! Fortunately, we found a cabbie to make the drive, and life was good...
I would love to go back to ischia for a couple more nights...either take a car over on the ferry, or hire scooters on the island to explore everywhere...plus I want more time in those thermal pools...and I bet there are good hiking trails :)