Sunday 26th February

We managed to get more sleep this time, but it was still pretty restless night! I woke up about an hour before we arrived and the scenes passing by were lovely. We went by a massive lake, still half frozen, and rolling hills which gave me a good feeling about Budapest.

We got into Budapest around 8:30am we got our bearings quite quickly and started our little walk to our hostel. We have come to the conclusion that the area surrounding the train stations are a bit 'run down'. With possibly the exception of Amsterdam where it was just sleazy! I wasn't quite sure what I was expecting, but this wasn't it. We have been good though not to keep this initial thought of a place ruin our time and try to get to know the city in our short time we have and change our minds. With this in mind it was pretty hard to change my mind on my walk to the hostel. It was Sunday as well so quite a lot of things were closed and empty. We found our hostel, which looked like it was down a dodgy backstreet alley! But luckily the hostel didn't reflect the location it was in. We initially booked ourselves into another hostel but the hostel bookers website had advertised free spaces when this wasn't the case. The original hostel put us in their 'sister' hostel. It was on the 5th level of a residential building (more stairs!) with about 6 separate bedrooms. It was small, but cosy and the staff were great! We hung around until our room was ready around 10:30ish. We decided to go and visit one of Budapest's highlights, the thermal baths! It was a bit of a walk, and we did see another side of the city. Apparently the road we walked down is the 'Champs Elysees' of Budapest. Which I can imagine in the spring when the trees didn't look so ugly as they do now!

The Szechenyl baths were located in a middle of a park, we couldn't miss it any way, and it was the only yellow building in the area. We arrived and got dressed ready to dip into the pools. There were 3 outdoor pools with 15 indoor pools. We opted for the nearest outside pool. Even though the sun was out and had blessed us with amazing warmish weather, in a swimsuit it was still fricking cold! We ran and jumped into the pool, which was a cosy 34°c. It was pretty amazing. We floated around for a while enjoying the sunshine. We then decided to make a 10 meter run from the outside pool to the inside pools. It was freezing cold. We walked down the long corridor and in each section they had a different pool. Some were pretty cold, but we went for the 38°c pool. It felt like we were in a giant bath! After about 20/30 minutes in this pool I realised our mistake of coming to the baths after a night train! I was beginning to fall asleep. We left the warm pool and ran back outside to the cooler pool. At this point Stu realised he had lost the wrist band that the staff gave him. This led us to a fine of 2100HUF, don't worry, this roughly is about £6-7. So not a bad hit, but still!

We finally left the comfort of the warm baths and went via the train station to book our next train ticket. I was a little concerned as the Hungarians aren't too good at English or even understanding most of it. We have realised, with conformation, that Stu's voice is not understandable by most foreigners. So I have adapted to speaking to everyone and translating for Stu. He hasn't learnt to slow his speaking yet (not in a patronising way) and speaks at a million miles an hour, or just contradicts himself as he speaks and confuses everyone! The lady at the desk said we didn't need to reserve a space or need a ticket, which I found hard to believe as the Paris to Brussels train we had a ticket for seat reservations. I hoped she was right and we didn't lose her in translation!

We went back to the hostel, via the supermarket to choose our dinner! We got back to the hostel were one of the staff was watching a movie. I started watching it with her but realised it was a bit of a thriller and kind of creeped me out. I had no idea what was going on, I just hoped I didn't get any nightmares after! I managed to find episodes of Mr. Bean that were in English and not dubbed over or anything! Brilliant! So we watched about 3 episodes. There were loads of films on like Flubber, but Robin Williams was dubbed over and he didn't sound the same in Hungarian! We put on Horrible Bosses after dinner to keep ourselves awake until a decent time to go to bed. We had to be up early again to check out so we were in bed by 11pm!

I also found out that the Hungarian alphabet contain 44 letters, which is crazy!

Monday 27th February

We had to check out by 10am which is beginning to be an almighty pain in the ass, and we have worked out we need roughly 1hr30 to get washed, dressed and pack. We did some washing the night before so we both had to re-pack our bags, I am beginning to become an expert in packing but the novelty of living out of a backpack is starting to annoy me! I am looking forward to when we can stay put for longer than 2 days so I don't have to feel like I am living out of a bag!

We didn't make it out for the morning free tour so we had a wonder around town. We went to the market which is on every weekday. It was pretty big and very busy. The market had everything from Vegetables to meat to souvenirs! We had a wonder around looking at everything on offer! Found another magnet for Mum (Stu picked this one so if it is 'rubbish' you can blame him as I told him it was ugly!). We walked along the river in the direction of the free tour, we got there early so found sanction in a nearby coffee shop. The sun again had come out and it did warm you up, but the wind was very bitter and for most of the day it felt like I've eaten too much ice cream and given myself brain freeze!

We found our tour and headed off, I am beginning to love these free tours, admittedly we are giving them a decent £10 tip, but we have learnt a lot. We had no history knowledge of Hungary at all, and we learnt a lot.

The square we meet in was in front of the St. Stephen's Basilica, it is named in honour of Stephen, the first King of Hungary, whose mummified fist is housed in the reliquary. There are a lot of buildings/streets in honour of the first King.

We crossed the chain bridge into the eastern side of Budapest…Buda! From this side of Budapest we got a great few of, you guessed it, Pest! We saw the Parliament building, which looks similar to the Palace of Westminster in London; the Parliament Building is in the Gothic style. It is 268 meters which is 2/3 meters longer than the London Parliament making it the biggest at the time. Until Romania heard this and built theirs bigger! It is 96 meters tall, the same Saint Stephen's Basilica. The number 96 refers to the nation's millennium, 1896, and the conquest of the later Kingdom of Hungary in 896. Construction from the winning plan was started in 1885 and completed in 1904. So it missed the dead line! These are the two tallest buildings and nothing is allowed to be higher than these.

We walked up castle hill to Buda castle; it wasn't the most impressive castles I have seen but lovely to admire. There were some fantastic sculptures around the castle grounds though. One of the best pieces was a fountain (which wasn't on as it was winter) of a hunting party led by Matthias Corvinus, the king of Hungary. It was very impressive; it managed to survive WWII with only minor damage.

There is also another statue called the Turul Monument. In the legends the leader of the Hungarian tribes had a dream in which eagles attacked their horses and a Turul came and saved them. This symbolised that they had to migrate, and when they did so, the Turul helped them to show the way and eventually led them to the land that became Hungary.

After the long walk up to the castle it was coming onto 4:30pm, our train was at 8pm and we needed to go back to the hostel to collect our bags. We also thought about booking a bed this time as it was only €30 for the both of us. Hungary has been a lot cheaper than we'd imagine! It has been great; there is roughly 300HUF to the £1, so we have felt like millionaires with our 10,000 notes in our pockets!

We got back and walked back to the station and went to book our ticket, apparently we were too late but could book it once we got on the train. This seemed so weird to us and couldn't grasp how we didn't have a ticket (not including our interrail passes) for this particular train like all the rest. We found out the train is splitting 3 ways, which we hate. One part is going to Berlin, One to Prague and the rest to Warsaw. We have found the carriage that goes to Warsaw, we hope! We opted to just go for the seating section to make things easier. The ticket inspector did come round and took one look at our ticket and just carried on. I guess we didn't actually need a ticket for this train, so our (mainly mine) worries have gone and we have relaxed! So we have settled in for our last 'free' journey which is included on the interrail pass, 11 whole hours of rattling, chuggering train. The only thing I like about trains in Europe is that they are on time and once you know how to find your carriage etc its easy. Something I don't look forward to when travelling by train in the UK.

Overall view on Budapest:

Despite the initial view of the city, it does have character. I don't think most cities will be able to live up to the views that Prague had to offer but it had its charm. Navigation was pretty easy to work out however there is a sense of a language barrier that I haven't felt so far on my trip but sure will happen more often now. Also trying to work out what signs and words mean are becoming more of a challenge. If I had more time I would explore more of the city and surrounding countryside. Who knows, maybe I'll return to give it another chance.

Total miles from UK: 1352

Transport taken:

Trains = 6

Hours ahead of UK:

+1

Our Photos:

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