Budapest or Buda”pesht” as they pronounce it here was a pleasant surprise. We had heard mixed things prior to coming here and it wasn’t on our original itinerary but I think we are both glad we came. This might be partially because it was sunny and warm for the first time on our trip and we wore sandals and shorts the whole time. We stayed in a “Vintage Studio” AirBnB a 25 minute walk from the city center. It was smaller and darker then our place in Prague but we made the most of it. It was situated in a building with a big courtyard and a stray cat that meowed all day long and which Al befriended.
Our first night we walked around the Inner City which was full of life. We passed by a “movie in the park” type of event at the Opera house where they were showing one of the Hungarian operas for free. There were tons of people sitting in groups socializing and drinking wine and beer all throughout the city on steps, benches, and in parks. There were colorful lights everywhere - restaurants, trees, bridges, buildings were all lit up. We grabbed a cheap bottle of wine (Hungary is actually 3rd biggest wine producer after France and Italy with 23 wine regions, who knew?!) which actually ended up being sweet and delicious and we sat for a while drinking and people watching along the Danube River, the river that separates the two sides of the city into the hilly Buda and the flat Pesht side (Budapest was originally separated into 2 different cities). We asked a couple sitting near us to take a picture for us and we ended up talking to them for a while and learned they are from Azerbaijan, a country I feel ashamed to say I had never really heard of before. But this is one of my favorite things about traveling, you learn new things about the world and the people in it! They were very nice and added Al on Facebook and said they would show us around if we ever visited! We wandered the city a little more and soon realized we were locked out of our apartment building when we got back. Our key fob wasn’t working and our host never gave us a code. We had a moment of panic but after about 10 minutes a drunk British guy who lived in the building came and let us in. Phew.
The next day we got up to do a free walking tour of the city. We usually go to grocery stores and get breakfast food and snacks to have in the morning but most were closed the day we got there since it was Saturday. Needless to say, Al and I were a little grumpy and made our first trip to McDonalds (not proud of it). I got a muffin and Al got hash browns and orange juice. Our walking tour was nice but we didn’t learn as much as on some of the others. Hungarian history was similar to Czech Republic in that it was under a Communist regime for a while and it wasn’t until 1990 that they had Parliamentary elections, the first free elections since 1945. The Hungarian language or magyar as they call it is different from most European languages. Our tour guide told us the language structure is similar to the native languages in Estonia and Finland, all of which share common ancestors. Hungary still doesn’t use the Euro and instead uses the Hungarian Forint. They have thought about switching to the Euro but the government believes they aren’t strong enough to make the transition yet. Hungary was also at one point part of the Ottoman Turkish Empire which is where the Turkish bath influence comes from as well as the use of Paprika in Hungarian dishes. Lastly we learned the Danube River that flows through the city in total flows through eight countries and four capital cities.
After some down time in the afternoon, we grabbed some “Mexican” food and went to Budapest’s most famous “ruin pub” which was one of the coolest bars I have ever been to. It was called Szimpla Kert and it was in an old building and consisted of tons of lights and funky decorations, two floors, a live band, several different rooms with different types of drinks and music, and just cool vibes in all. We each enjoyed a beer.
The next day we walked around some of the other common tourist spots. We went to Heroes square, City Park, Vajdahunyad Castle, Central Market Hall, and we walked to the entrance of the Szechenyi Thermal baths although we didn’t go in (it was a little pricey and crowded). We went on a cheap evening cruise on the river which was nice because we were able to get great views of the buildings and bridges lit up at night. We also had ice cream twice this day because it was hot and humid and just because it was good.
Our last day in Budapest we had a lazy day because it was much colder, windy, and rainy. There’s part of us that feels like we’re wasting time if we’re not going out and doing things but this relaxation turned out to be just what we needed. We walked around a bit and grabbed some Pho for lunch and went to a grocery store to stock up on snacks for our eight hour train ride the next day to Slovenia.
Overall, we enjoyed our time in Budapest. We ate most of our meals in the Jewish quarter which had around 300 restaurants and bars and we used public transportation every day to get places. We were very conservative with our spending (it’s also pretty cheap in Hungary) but still did everything we wanted to. After five cities, we are definitely ready for some nature.
On to Slovenia!