After a good night’s sleep, I set out this morning on a day of touring Budapest. My first stop was the Central Market a few blocks from the hostel. But it’s Sunday so it was closed. I did get a peak inside through the window and it looks enormous. I think I missed out on this one. From there I took a leisurely stroll over the bridge to the Buda side. I had my eyes set on climbing to the top of Gellert’s Hill and taking in the views of the city. Towards the base of the hill, I took a [View Full Entry]

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After last night’s merry making I, along with all the other guests at the hostel, took our times getting up and getting ready. I still hadn’t done any research on what there is to do in Budapest when Steve asked what I was up to today. He said a lot of people were going to a Turkish thermal bath in the city. Sure. I’m in. We walked to a nearby metro which we’d use to get to the bath house. The metro here is apparently the second oldest in Europe. And it shows. The trains are very short and the stations [View Full Entry]

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I arrived in Budapest this afternoon. Another uneventful train ride. The train was late again. They seem to always be. Not a big deal - I don’t have grand plans here. The hostel in Budapest is a bit different than most I’ve stayed at. It’s much more of a laid back crowd. I could easily see them having the place on a beach with a campfire if they could. A guitar hung from above the couch as some of the guests lounged around and rested up for another night on the town. Once I was settled in, quite an ordeal since [View Full Entry]

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We made it through Romania and came back to Budapest this afternoon. I never thought I'd be so happy to be in Hungary again. Romania was the most interesting country we went to, but only because of its challenge and bizarreness. The people in Romania were very nice and helpful, but the policemen were a little odd. Again today on the train back we kept getting asked and asked again for tickets or passports. They would disappear with our passports, which made me uneasy. One policeman began questioning us where we went in Romania. In the middle of me listing off [View Full Entry]

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Today we woke up pretty late because we were all tired from flying. We were able to go out and walk around for a few hours, though. I didn't have my camera with me, so I don't have pictures, but we didn't do a whole lot besides walk around. We did go over to the university and did all our registration type stuff. Orientation things start on Thursday, so we still have some time to explore. We found a different supermarket on the next street over that is small but has a decent amount of stuff. The huge Central Market has [View Full Entry]

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After over 8 hours of flight time, I arrived safely in Budapest via SwissAir around 14:00. The flights were uncomfortable, but the service and food were very good, and the entertainment on the long flight was enough to get me through over 6 hours. The airport was extremely crowded, but we managed to get our bags and find our driver with little hassle. He was a nice Hungarian man who spoke fairly good English, so we were able to chat with him during our 20 minute ride to the apartment. He drove like a madman - weaving in and out of [View Full Entry]

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I am not sure what to say about Budapest. It is so many places all at once. It reminded us a bit of Prague in terms of the ornate nature of its architecture but it seemed a magnitude in size bigger and the old buildings were generally in poorer condition. We walked for hours looking at what could be some of the most beautiful buildings if anyone was willing to restore them. Clearly this city was once one of the most beautiful places in the world, but years of war and economic hardship including years of communism took much of the [View Full Entry]

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With the title, I can only be in one place, Hungary. I arrived to a very crowded train station, with many people coming up to me asking if I want a taxi, room to stay, change money, some of it legitimate, some of this not so much. I walked to the Mellow Mood Hostel and Hotel information booth they have permanantly set up in the station, and asked for a bed in a dorm room at the Marco Polo Hostel. A good name for a traveller. This was done, and they even had a shuttle bus to take us to our [View Full Entry]

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It’s relatively common knowledge that Budapest was originally two separate cities, divided by the great muddy ribbon of the Danube. There’s Buda on the western side, all hills, parks, and castles. Then there’s Pest in the east, a wide, flat stretch of both grand avenues and more down to earth residential areas. Buda has the main tourist highlights; Pest is where the party is at. During the Habsburg days, Buda was the German side of the city; Pest was the Magyar hot-bed. The two cities, along with the town of Óbuda, were not officially united as Budapest until 1873 (I gu [View Full Entry]

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Yesterday was a scorching day in Budapest. We enjoyed the morning - toured the Great Market Hall and had a nice lunch before heading back to our hotel to pick up our luggage and move on to our new hotel close to the airport. We decided to take the subway since the hotel directions said it was an easy 5 minute walk from the last subway station. We had written detailed directions but, sometimes things don't go as planned. The street that we were supposed to turn left on after exiting the station was not marked and we ended up walking [View Full Entry]

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