Following our recent trip to Morocco, my mate Jim and I still had itchy feet, so out came our trusty Lonely Planet “Happy Weekend” book. On opening up we landed on Budapest, a city I had long wished to visit, so a decision was made to scope out the best way to get there and when. After a bit of research, we found that the city’s Christmas Market was opening on the 17th November so we wanted to go after that. Down we went to visit Michelle at Kenneth MacLeod Travel and set her the challenge of sorting us out, and although we set her a budget this time, we were booked to go a few short days later.
Our first flight was the Red-Eye to Frankfurt from Glasgow, which meant leaving the house at 04:00am to get through parking and security for the flight at 06:00. This flight went well and we arrived in Frankfurt early, which meant we had plenty of time to relax and catch a bit of breakfast before our flight to Budapest, which was a wee bit delayed. On arrival we caught the excellent 100E direct shuttle bus into the city centre, where we wanted to get a local bus to the hotel, unfortunately, the local buses don’t take cash and we had no working Wi-Fi to allow us to buy tickets so took a chance and got on one anyway and arrived easily at our hotel, the Danubius Hungaria, around 15:00.
Once checked into a nice room and connected to their Wi-Fi we discovered how to use the public transport and picked up a city map then went for a walk to find one of the rest area restaurants recommended in our Guidebook we quickly found Rakoczi, a restaurant that was highly rated in our guide book for serving traditional Hungarian food. After a wonderful meal, we then visited Rizmajer a local brewhouse for a couple of beers before returning to the hotel at the end of a very nice but busy day.
Our first full day in Budapest started with an excellent breakfast in the hotel, where we made our plans on how to make the most of our visit, we discovered that all the various Hop-on-Hop-off (Ho-Ho) bus companies had merged and that they provided good value tours of the city and included a Danube boat cruise, so off we set to catch one. The ticket office was just across the road from St Stephen’s Basilica where the Christmas Market was situated. Still, we left that treat until later and boarded the bus for an orientation tour of the city’s highlights, thankfully the weather was nice to us and we were able to sit on the upper deck for a better view of this beautiful city. During our journey, we stopped off in the Kupak Bar & Bistro to sample some traditional Goulash soup and a beer for lunch, before going round the corner to visit the stunning Dohány Street Synagogue. This building, built between 1854 and 1859 reminded us somewhat of our time in Morocco with its decoration based mainly on Islamic models. We enjoyed our tour especially when we reached the garden with its Tree of Life Memorial, designed by Imre Varga in 1991 and paid for by the late American actor Tony Curtis. On leaving the Synagogue we thought we would sample another of Budapest’s delicacies, a Chimney Cake, we both chose to have an apple strudel version, topped with freshly whipped cream, they were most delicious.
We returned to the hotel to freshen up and have a siesta, before a 30-minute wander down to the Basilica to visit the Christmas Market, where we enjoyed seeing all the stalls selling trinkets and Christmas items, there was a spectacular light display on the front of the Basilica which we watched while eating Langos, another Hungarian delicacy, which is basically a deep fried flatbread with different toppings, Jim had his usual chicken while I had one with sausage and onion, both of them were really tasty and very filling. The perfect way to finish off the day was a visit to Szimpla Kert, one of Budapest’s iconic ruin bars, this place is inside a dilapidated pre-war building in the Jewish Quarter, furnished with junk furniture in its nine bars all built out of old doors and windows, it was a real cool place to visit.
The next morning, after another great breakfast we caught the first Ho-Ho bus of the day and took it up to Heroes’ Square where we made our way into the City Park to visit the Széchenyi Baths, one of the largest thermal bath complexes in Central Europe, these baths are one of Budapest’s most famous. With an exceptional backdrop of classical columns and canary-yellow walls, it was a great way to spend a morning lounging in some of its indoor and outdoor pools, although it was a chilly 10 degrees outside, the thermal waters at 30 degrees in all the pools was a fabby treat and great fun, we could have easily spent the whole day there. Whilst visiting the Christmas Market the previous evening, we managed to meet part one of ‘Dan’s Challenge’ in finding a Starbucks to buy a mug, to complete the challenge we returned to town to find a Lego Store and eventually found one in one of the large shopping malls.
A quick bus trip took us down to the river to catch an evening cruise on the Danube as part of our Ho-Ho ticket, this was most enjoyable, the view of the city in the evening light with the buildings illuminated gave us yet another view of the city.
On our way back to the hotel, we were on the lookout for somewhere to go for dinner, we stumbled upon the Amigo Rockabilly Bar just around the corner from the hotel, it turned out to be just what we were looking for, a true dive bar, its 1950’s Elvis and Rock and Roll theme was interesting, but the staff, service and food could not be bettered, and the beer was very good too.
As we had only bought a 2-day Ho-Ho ticket, after breakfast we went to the railway station and purchased a 24-hour public transport ticket then headed over to the Buda side to spend the morning touring the castle and palace. The castle was spectacular, just like a real-life fairy tale. The palace and its grounds came a close second, we were even treated to a changing of the guard in all its precision. Back down on the riverbank, we made our way to the Central market hall for a wander around the stalls, and some lunch in Fakanál Étterem one of its many eateries, the food was good and we were entertained by a couple of in-house musicians.
The opulent Parliament House was our next stop, however, being closed to the public, all we could do was see the outside and the gardens. After walking across the Chain Bridge for our morning coffee and wandering around quite a bit despite our travel passes, we went back to the hotel for a wee siesta and to decide what we fancied for dinner. We thought it would be good to revisit the Ruins Bars and on our way there we came across Frici Papa’s, we had seen this place before on our travels, and as it had received good reviews and gauging by the queues outside, we thought we would try our luck. After a short wait, we got a table and discovered that the food and service lived up to the reviews. We cut our visit to the Ruins Bar short after one pint, as it was so crowded we found it difficult to get a seat and made our way back to the hotel stopping of in Amigo’s again, tonight it was a bit different, there was a karaoke in full flow when we got there, it turned out to be very entertaining listening to amateur Hungarian singers sing Hungarian Songs with the occasional song in English, it was such great fun we stayed until the end of the night.
Friday was our last day so after yet another great breakfast we went back to the riverside to see the Shoes on the Danube Bank, a touching memorial erected in 2005, to honour the Jews who were massacred by fascist Hungarian militia during the Second World War. They were ordered to take off their shoes (shoes were valuable and could be stolen and resold by the militia after the massacre) and were shot at the edge of the water so that their bodies fell into the river and were carried away. The memorial represents their shoes left behind on the bank.
A return to the nearby Central Market Hall for lunch, in a different eatery without the music, and a look at the loaded produce stalls finished off the early afternoon. We took a stroll along Vaci Utca one of Budapest’s popular shopping district finishing off in the Pointer Bar, Budapest’s version of a Weatherspoon’s for a refreshing pint before catching the bus back to the hotel to collect our luggage.
A local bus back into the city centre and the 100E back to the airport saw us start our journey home, despite a slight delay in Budapest we arrived in Frankfurt in plenty of time to catch our flight to Glasgow, our only problem being the lack of open food outlets at Frankfurt at night. We arrived back in a chilly Glasgow and quickly made our way home tired but happy after yet another great trip away.
Jim's travels 