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| Budapest Parliament Buildings at Dusk |
After our visit to Esztergom is our 48 km drive into
our hotel in Budapest. We arrive before rush hour and getting settled was
pretty easy. Out for a bit of a walk and a nice meal before bed we realize we
are really well situated for taking in the sites.
As most already know Buda
Pest is made up of two cities with Buda being the west city (older) and
Pest the east city (newer). Buda has the old castle, St Matthias Church
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| St Matthias at Dusk |
and the
Fishermans Bastion.
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| Parliament from Fishermans Bastion |
Pest has more modern hotels, restaurants etc.
From our experience now, we would say Pest is much busier,
noisier, with Buda being more congested, and slower.
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| Shoes on the Danube Jewish Memorial |
The best treat of our stay was a small restaurant called the
Hungarian Bistro. It was so good the first day we ate there after seeing the
“Shoes on the Danube”,
about 4 blocks away, that we made a special trip back
there a second day . The first day we had Duck, and the 2nd time
Goulash soup, and then an appetizer of Hungarian Gnocchi with sour cream and
fried bacon bits. This place was outstanding! And they even give away in a nice
folder, a copy of the soup recipe.
From our hotel/apt. we visited the chain Bridge, St Matthias
Church, the Bastion, the old Castle, and used the vantage point for taking
pictures of the Parliament buildings, the most common picture in Budapest.
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| Parliament Buildings by Day |
Then
back over the Chain bridge to the Shoes on the Danube, another reminder of the
Nazi era where they had the Jews take off their footwear since it was valuable,
before they shot them and pushed them off into the Danube river.
That evening we retraced our steps again to see the city at
night and enjoy the night lights and activity.
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| Chain Bridge at Night |
Our 2nd full day saw us attend the Market hall
where we bought spicy paprika and a jar of very hot sauce made from paprika.
This was after having sampled it at the Hungarian Bistro. From there after
lunch we hiked out to Heroes Square. Originally we were going to go out to the
Baths there as well but learned that the outdoor baths had closed the day
before. Even though the weather was 25-27C each day we were there the outdoor
baths were now considered closed for the winter.
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| St Matthias at Night |
After 3 nights we headed back out toward Esztergom and to
cross back into Slovakia to follow the Danube for a while on its way upstream
to Bratislava. This was a Saturday morning and everyone in Budapest was heading
out there was well. The 48 km drive was bumper to bumper most of the way, but after
Esztergom on the Slovakian side it was a nice drive into Bratislava.
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