Budapest

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On Saturday, June 2 we were in Krakow taking in the 750th anniversary gala. I went to book our train tickets to Budapest and discovered that no sleeper berths were available Sunday night. The anniversary weekend had brought in alot of vistors for the weekend.

We quickly decided to book tickets for tht night to Budapest. There were no 4 sleeper compartments on this train. Just doubles and triples. The last openings were a double and two slots in a triple. (Our mystery passenger in the triple was a German university student.) We splurged on a hasty last meal of wild boar, pierogi (dumplings with cottage cheese, meat), and fruit, sauerkraut with veal and mushrooms, and Viennese cholocate chees cake.

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The train departed at 10:30PM and took 11 hours, arriving in Budapest at 9:30AM Monday morning. We slept for a good bit of the trip, although the border crossing from Poland-->Slovakia and Sloavkia-->Hungary required passport clearance at 2:30AM and 5:00AM.

We quickly went to our hotel...the Boomerang Hostel near St. Stephen's Basilica in Budapest ciy center. The hotel is run by an American, and we enjoyed getting some inside tips on seeing the city. Boomerang is located right off the metro andmain bus lines. Since we'd purchased a Budapest tourist card, all transit was free making it extremely easy to get around town. (The card also covers most  museum entrance fees.)

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We went to lunch at Gerbeaud, the most famous restaurant in Budapest. The food was good and very expensive...we had smoked goose breast and assorted pastries. Dinner at Lugas featured traditional Hungarian fare of chicken in white sauce mixed with peaches and bacon, a greek feta-like salad. We also had crepes filled with cottage cheese and peaches and drizzled with a vanilla crme for dessert,

On Monday, June 4th we awoke to more pastries. The shopkeeper looked at us strangely when we purchased no fewer than 10 different types of pastries. After breakfast it was off for a 3 hour tour of he city. The tour took in all of the main sites...Opera House, Heroes Memorial, City Park, Parliament and St. STephens on the Pest side. We also visited the Citadel, and Castle Hill (Royal Palace, Matthis Church, and Fisherman's Bastion).

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After lunch we took the metro to Szechenyi Baths, a hot springs spa located in City Park. Hungarians appear to be very heavy. The men in particular look to be carrying late-term quadruplets, while sporting small speedo bathing suits. Yuck! The baths were fun, comprised of a series of pools varying from 26-38 degrees Centigrade. One contained water and air jets, and also featured a circular rapids that adults and kids alike enjoyed.

Tuesday, June 5th we went to the Central Market Hall. It's a building containing hundreds of shops. The first floor is all fresh produce, vegetables, meats and pastries. The second floor contains souvenirs...lace, leather, and ceramic items are popular. There are also Hungarian style fast food stalls. Fried bread was particularly good. The basement was filled with a foul smelling live fish market. We didn't buy anything, but still enjoyed the experience.

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Later that afternoon we set out on an ill-fated trip to Statue Park. The trip required numerous bus/metro/tram links and took more than an hour to make. When the Communist regime fell in 1989, the monuments were kept and made into a park that highlights the era. Beyond the obligatory statues of Lenin, Marx and Engels, there is alot of state-sponsored sculptured works depicting the glories of motherhood, workers and soldiers. There is also a humorous 'boots sculpture', which is all that was left of a Stalin memorial after it was detonated in the 1956 uprising.