Day 25
The ride here yesterday was effortless! It was 2 hours of almost empty motorway, just lovely.
We found the hotel but passed it twice as we negotiated the complex one way system!
We managed to park behind the hotel eventually next to an underground car park which said it was 500 Hungarian Florins an hour (£1.26) which sounded extortionate, so Colin refused to leave the bike there whilst we checked in but when we had checked in we found that hotel guests could have a reduced rate so Colin then had to renegotiate the one way system to get back to the place we started from!
The first thing we did was to go and buy some new trousers, as my sightseeing ones had developed a large hole in a crucial place! After that we set of to see the sights and it soon became clear why the place has Unesco status.
We took the obligatory river cruise and if was great we learnt so much about the city and it's history whilst enjoying the sights.
We had our evening meal in a Chinese fast food place and boy was it fast! as they were ready for closing I think it took about 15 mins from ordering to leaving having eaten!! We wandered back towards the main squares and decided to order a bottle of wine at one of the outdoor cafes. We became worried that our conversion of Hungarian money to sterling was wrong as the waiter made a huge fuss of bringing the wine over and was very conscientious about making sure we were happy and kept coming over and topping up our glasses for us. Colin was more than relieved to find out that although by his standards it was expensive it certanly wasn't an exorbitant price- well he is used to £2.99 from Lidl if he's feeling expansive!!
Day 26
Today we went for breakfast and it was crazy, we haven't seen that many people since we were in Sweden! The choices were very good and the waiting staff were extremely efficient at clearing tables and restocking the buffet.
We have been having issues with the lift in the hotel as it is a really inefficient technique to make it work; you have to put your door card in but most of the time it doesn't register which makes Colin livid! So we walked down and up the 4 flights of stairs to breakfast and then found on our return to our room that they Key card wouldn't register in the lock, luckily the cleaner was next door and unlocked the room: we weren't so lucky tonight and Colin had to walk back down to Reception to get them reset - you can imagine how cross he was!
We set off for our sightseeing day at 10 this morning and returned at 9.30 this evening feeling extremely tired but well satisfied with our day. We had initially gone to look inside the parliament building but after looking at the queue and knowing that you were only let in in groups and escorted by armed guards we changed plans and went to the castle instead; where we spent 3 hours looking around the history of Budapest museum which had very few other tourists. Then, after lunch in a lovely little cafe in a supermarket we visited the labyrinths; which were great and again had the place almost to ourselves. We then walked over to an island were we rented a carriage bike made for 2 and cycled around the island, which was good fun!
We had our evening meal in a Jewish cafe, Colin had a traditional tomato based dish and I had a form of wrap; both were very nice and tasty.
We wandered back to the square from last night and had a glass of wine listening to a brilliant street entertainer playing the saxophone and watching an elderly couple dancing to his music; it was great.
One of the most poignant sights from our days here was a memorial to a group of Jewish people. As we walked along the Danube we came across on the waters edge a long line of bronze shoes and boots which was very sobering and quite moving; we guessed that it must represent something and we discovered that it was a memorial to a street of Jewish men, women and children who were taken down to the edge and executed by militiamen and their bodies washed away by the river.
What made it even more moving was that shortly before coming across this memorial we had been following a group of orthodox Jewish boys who were laughing and messing about; we think they were part of a Freshers week as they were also chanting and doing group activities.
Travelling through the different countries and seeing the devastation caused by all sides involved it is amazing to see all of those country's inhabitants being welcomed as tourists.