Blogs from Central Transdanubia, Hungary, Europe

Well, I'm laughing because I can't find the town I'm writing about so I just picked one that began with the same letter. Clueless. On our last day in Hungary we took a bus trip to the 1,000+ year old village of Szentendre. It was pleasant to drive a couple of hours outside Budapest to see the countryside. It is mostly flat farmland with no remarkable topographical features- read that as pretty 'ho-hum'. The village is trying desperately to attract tourists. I would say from the number of tour buses and various languages we heard that they are succeeding. Get there early (around 9:30am) to be before most of them arrive. The village has been pretty much untouched by 'urban renewal' or renewal of any kind except for some paint jobs so the architecture is authentic. ... read more

"Szállj, szállj sólyom szárnyán Három hegyen túl..." (Demjén F.)... read more

Hivatalos honlap: www.immmt.5mp.eu 2009-es elvonulás blogja: http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/blog-423044.html Idén is szépségesen nyugodt, mély elvonulásnak adott otthont Kisnyalka Július 8. és 25.-e között. A tavalyival ellentétben idén 8.-20. között tartottuk a hosszú (egyesek szerint "hardcore") elvonulást, melyet 21.-25 között egy lazább "freestyle" követett. A hosszabb elvonulásnak komoly megkötésekkel, időbeosztással némiképp szigorú rendje volt, míg a freestylet megpróbáltuk kötetlenebbre tervezni: olyanoknak, akik pár napra ki szeretnék próbálni a csendet, a nyugalmat, a városból, családból, társaságból való kiszakadást. Laurinot 7-én 11-kor kapta fel Ati és Zozó a Keletiben, és barátaival való rövid találkozás után lehozták Kisnyalkára. Itt egy szabad, orientációs nap következett, amikor megbeszéltük a napire... read more

(Excerpt from my book: OUR SUMMER IN SLOVENIA, AMAZON.COM) After a day-and-a-half to travel few hundered miles, we finally left Maribor and Slovenia about noon, our destination for the night, Lake Balaton in Hungary. I know, were still not in Budapest, but hang in there, we'll get there. To get to Lake Balaton from Maribor, one drives for about a half-hour through Croatia, so I expect Elysee and I can claim having also visited that recently ill-fated country. Lake Balaton is, outside of Scandinavia, the largest freshwater lake in Europe. A long finger-like lake of a little more than 50 miles, but a narrow 10 miles at its widest, it is also shallow, averaging a mere nine feet in depth. Nevertheless, it has long been Hungary’s summer vacation destination and has that mixture of tackiness and ... read more

There are few things in this world more irritating to me than being hella late. I was hella late, and then some. After the nearly four hours of waiting in Frankfurt, I'd gotten on the flight to Ferihegy and promptly passed-out. No, really, I was out before we even took to the sky. I vaguely recall the flight attendant smiling at me as she got up to do her, "this is how you unbuckle your seatbelt, and if this is news to you you really need to get out more" routine, but only vaguely. I did wake up just long enough to confuse the hell out of the purser, who kept trying to push a cheese sandwich on me. I'd take the steps (as usual) of booking a kosher meal on my flights, both because it's ... read more

This posting is a day late due to technical difficulties which were solved by a friendly computer store which restored my Windows. Today we drove from Budapest to Heviz which is a resort town on Lake Balaton. There is a 4 hectare hot spring/lake and Europeans travel here for therapeutic reasons. Very picturesque town but still lots of tourists even though the temperature continues to be cool. Hotel is very nice with a view of the valley and easy walking distance to local sights. Had dinner at a restaurant complete with Hungarian musicians and dancers. Tomorrow we travel to Ljubljana in Slovenia. Drivers here are VERY aggressive. Not that unusual to be passed by vehicles travelling at 200kph estimated.... read more