hungary: budapest

When Katie was first planning her trip to Europe, she had to figure out where she was going to go...one family she babysits for in the states is half Hungarian, and when they found out she was going to Europe, they told her she had to go to Budapest, and stay in their family flat...when she told me, of course I agreed :)
We took the train from Amsterdam to Eindhoven, and a bus from that train station to the Eindhoven airport...even the guidebook says Eindhoven isn't known for anything in particular, except for the increasing number of budget flights from this airport...

The flight was easy, as was landing in Budapest...Katie collected her bag and as we exited she saw the grandma of the family waiting for us...grandma drove us to the flat, gave us the nickel tour, then said she would be back in the morning...
She came back the next morning and walked with us to the metro stop...she also drew us a map, but I'm really glad she walked with us, as I never would've been able to follow her map...she also bought our first metro tickets, yahoo!

This first metro ride was only to the center of town, to an information office, where we picked up the Budapest card each of us had bought...the card entitled us to free entry to some sights, free public transport, and as couple other benefits...
The next chore was to find a ticket office where Katie could buy a train ticket to split, Croatia...after that was accomplished, we hopped back on the metro...
A couple stops later we got out, and picked a direction in which to walk...somehow we stumbled onto the platz in front of st Stephen's basilica...it's a big platz...

we didn't know what we were looking at, we had to check the map...how awesome that we stumbled across what is probably the most important church in the country...we ate lunch at a cafe on the platz...
We went in the church, I was really impressed...so was Katie...I'm not often impressed by churches anymore, but this church was worth it...around the back, in a small, closed off chapel, we saw the mummified hand of st Stephen...I don't remember the story of the mummified hand, I don't need to remember...I'm both fascinated and grossed out by mummies...

We walked out of the church, and down the street in front of the church...there were a couple cafés, a couple souvenir shops, and a couple office buildings on the street...at the end if the street we went right, to cross a small park...at each end of the park was a statue, each person was probably important...I found them picturesque :)
Between this park and the river was a big street...we crossed the street, and took in the view...we were on the pest side of the river, so we had a great view of the chain bridge, over to the Buda side, with the castle and such...an awesome view...

We walked across the chain bridge, which had been turned into a pedestrian bridge for the holiday...
I suppose now is a good time to mention that we visited Budapest over the festival of st Stephen, one of the biggest holidays of the year, as st Stephen is the patron saint of the country...
There were plenty of people out walking, enjoying the great weather and the holiday...heaps of people taking photos, of course...i don't know if everyone in the country gets the day before the official festival off, but it certainly seemed that way...

We walked each way along the river, checking out the food stalls set up for the holiday...one of the stalls was selling the official birthday cake of Hungary...there were two options, one of which was sugar free...(what's the pour of sugar free cake?)...we bought the other choice, which I was excited to try, until Katie told me she could smell and taste alcohol...booo...it looked good, I had to satisfy myself by smelling and looking...
After food, we found the funicular and took it up the hill...a short ride, but fun...unfortunately, not super cheap, and not included in the budapest card...it should be!

The funicular let us out at a spot on top of castle hill...we went right, walking past a couple impressive buildings...we turned right again as we came upon the church of st Matthew...otherwise known as the coronation church...this is where hungary's kings were crowned, though that no longer happens...
Katie wasn't as impressed by this church...I wasn't either, but it was by no means a shabby church...a small area on the second floor was a museum, with some history displayed...

At the back of the church is a bit of stone carving...according to the sign, this was the oldest stone carving still in it's original location in either the country or city...
After the church, we took a quick glance at the Fisherman's bastion, which had great views over the river...there is an entrance fee, but both of us were satisfied with what we saw for free :) ...(that and we didn't know where the actual paid entrance was)
We walked back in the direction of the funicular, stopping in a small supermarket for water and snacks...

From there we walked to the Budapest history museum...we got to a set of gates, only to find a folk festival taking place...the folk festival had an entry fee, and we weren't interested in the festival, but the only way to get to the museum was to go through the festival...argh...we showed our Budapest cards to the guys taking money, and explained where we wanted to go...one of them used his walkie talkie to speak with someone, then asked us to wait a couple minutes...

Eventually someone from the museum came out to escort us through the festival to the museum...(on the way back we had to do the same thing in reverse order)...
The museum itself covered a large period of history, I don't think it's possible to really take in everything in one visit...my favourite exhibit was the one that showed various habitations of people in the Budapest area through history...from small homes to soviet style apartment blocks and everything in between...we didn't have time to see everything in the museum before closing time came...

After this museum, we took the funicular back down the hill, then went back to one of the food stalls for dinner...then we walked back across the river, and followed the bank of the river for a bit...we had purchased tickets for an evening river cruise, a popular tourist activity...(totally worth it)
It took us a while to find the exact company with which we'd booked, then the lady tried to tell Katie she didn't have a reservation...she was actually quite rude about it...I was watching what she was typing, and realized she was typing the reservation number incorrectly, and told her so...she was only slightly contrite when she had to face her mistake...
We boarded the boat and I took a couple photos of Buda hill, brightly lit up across the water...as the boat started to move, we put on our earphones and listened to the spiel...it was a bit confusing (they were trying to be creative) but I enjoyed learning something about a few of the buildings we passed on the river...

both Katie and I noticed the family in front of us had wasted the money they'd spent on this cruise...both parents were glued to their phones, barely looking up, not wearing the headphones...the oldest kid was also attached to her phone, taking several selfies and texting them two friends...the two youngest kids were running around, but at least they looked out the window a couple times...
Anywho, after the cruise ended, we took the metro home and went to bed fast...

The next morning was the festival of st Stephen...(the festival is only one day officially, but preparations take a bit longer and some events take longer)...
We'd read in the guidebook that there is still a crown of Hungary, though there is no longer a monarchy...the crown is occasionally displayed for the public in the halls of parliament, on holidays...we figured this must be one of those days...we took off early in order to get to parliament before the expected queue got too long...our timing worked out well, as there was a queue, but it wasn't too long...

the line started moving soon, and moved steadily...occasionally we looked back to see the line growing quickly...
Eventually we got to the front of the queue, and went through security...we followed everyone up the stairs into a grand entry hall, marveling at just about everything...while on the boat tour we'd heard there are something like 11km of stairs/hallways in parliament, we only saw a small amount...after the entry hall we followed into the next room, which was where the crown was displayed...there were guards around the walls of the room, I think nearly the only thing they did all day was tell people photos were not allowed in that particular area...that didn't stop some people, who still took photos from other sports when the guards weren't looking...both Katie and I were surprised that the crown wasn't very shiny, it didn't seem very blingy...it's not as if I have heaps of experience with crowns to be able to make such a judgement, but I remember being under impressed...

After exiting parliament, we walked as far as we could to the banks of the river...unfortunately this was when we came to the point where we were not happy about the holiday festival, as the sidewalks this close to the water were blocked off by fences...argh...we'd wanted to see a modern art piece on the sidewalk, we had to settle for seeing it from a distance, through the fence...
We walked along the river back toward the centre area, eventually getting to the great synagogue...it's the biggest synagogue in Europe...we had to wait in a short queue to buy entrance tickets, which was annoying only because it was raining...the worship area had several tour groups, the guides giving information quietly...

There was an upstairs area that had been turned into a museum...some exhibits showed items used in Jewish life, some showed the history of this synagogue and it's congregation, and some showed some of what happened in the Holocaust...a small museum, but I liked it because I was able to absorb the information without feeling overwhelmed...
There was a memorial garden out back...very peaceful...
Lunch was in a random cafe across the street...
From the cafe we took a tram across a different bridge to the chapel in the rock...the entrance fee included an audio guide (a bit too preachy for me) so we learned more than the guidebook said...various chapels had different stories to tell...the church is more of a natural cave that has been carved out a little more to make a small church...

Across the street from the chapel is the Gellert baths, some of the biggest in the city...the lobby area was pretty impressive...
More walking (back across the bridge and down a pedestrian street) took us to Gerbaud...Katie's friends in the states told us we had to go there for tea, and I'm so glad we did...everything on the menu looked good, it took us a while to figure out what we wanted...it was very well presented, and really good...(and our waiter was good looking too:)...
After tea we used the subway and more walking to get to lukacs baths...our Budapest cards included free entrance to these baths, of course we wanted to know what all the fuss was about...
There wasn't much English inside, it took us a while to figure out where to go and what to do...but once we did, it was fun...the baths were all heated to different temperatures, (the coldest was 32C and the hottest 40C)...everyone moved around every so often...we were plenty pickled by the time we left...

As we walked toward a metro stop to get home, we crossed another bridge, covered with people staking out a spot for the fireworks scheduled that evening...I bet people come out there pretty early in the day, the bridge spots were a great place to see everything...we heard most of the show, which was impressive...loud too...
That was our last night in Budapest...we took the metro home, it wasn't nearly as crowded as I expected, considering all the people out to see the fireworks...
The next morning both of us were up, and left the city...I have to go back!