Advertisement
Published: August 19th 2014
Edit Blog Post
On our way to Lake Bled now, just over halfway through a nine hour journey that really should have been done overnight, but the train times wouldn't work out. As it is we only have 7 minutes to make our next change, so here's hoping we're not delayed!
Budapest was a very different stop to what we'd done beforehand. For starters, despite hearing many great things about the city, our main reason for visiting was to attend the Sziget festival, which was on our second day there. Via a tram and train, and following the crowds, we arrived at the 'Island of Freedom', ironic as there was a fair amount of security to get onto it! Acts on the main stage began at 4, but the first act we were keen to see were the Kooks at 5.30 and we arrived a short way into their set. Both enjoying the music, we sang along to the songs we knew, and worked on developing our 'festival sway'. The atmosphere was great, lots of people having a good time, and only improved as the night went on, unlike the smell from the portaloos! Outkast followed next, they created a more
charged atmosphere, getting the crowd excited with classics such as Sorry Miss Jackson and Hey Ya! The last act on the main stage was Calvin Harris, and by the time he arrived the crowds had swelled enormously. Fortunately, Chelsea had suggested that we weave our way forwards as soon as Outkast left, so we managed to get a good position about ten metres back from the stage, at which point the press of bodies made further progress impossible. Despite our somewhat naive choice of footwear, we both wore flip flops, we only had our toes trodden on a few times, and in my case, Chelsea was the main culprit. The Calvin Harris set was pretty insane, all songs we recognised from nights out, and the whole crowd barely stopped bouncing from start to finish. As Chelsea is vertically challenged, I lifted her onto my shoulders for a while, to give her a better view, let her breathe some fresh air, and because it's almost obligatory at festivals. The set ended with fireworks and we made our way to a dj set which was playing out plenty of crowd-pleasers and happened to have Tom and Jerry cartoons playing on some screens,
which I struggled to tear my eyes away from! We finished the night by purchasing a 'giant burger' and a delicious nutella and banana pancake, before heading back to our hostel, arriving at just after 3am, and washed the grime from our feet before going to bed. I wasn't convinced that I would enjoy a festival beforehand, but I'm glad Chelsea persuaded me, as we both had a brilliant time.
We stayed at the Budapest Budget hostel, a last minute change after we were unable to add an extra day to our stay at the HBC hostel which we had previously booked. Despite its name and bleak exterior, the hostel was in fact clean, comfortable and well-decorated, and our room was excellent, spacious, with an ensuite bathroom with a double-bed on the mezzanine level above it. The kitchen was relatively well-equipped and Chelsea was happy to purchase coffee each morning for 200 'huffs' (HUF).
We arrived in Budapest early in the morning, feeling fairly tired after our overnight train. Chelsea found out about yet another free walking tour, so we rushed down to the meeting point after we had got ourselves settled in our
room, and joined up with Andy's tour. He was a very enthusiastic and engaging guide, although his repeated refrain of a bad joke, followed by "just kidding...or not... it's a bad joke...anyway" started to grate after the tenth or so time. We found that Budapest was not as beautiful as Prague, and not as spectacular as Berlin, but we still enjoyed walking around, both Buda and Pest, crossing over the chain bridge, hearing about its history and seeing some of its more special sites, such as the breath-taking St Stephens Basilica and the Matthias Church. The palace was not quite so brilliant to behold, its windows, broken during the war, having been replaced with plastic frames during the communist era.
The next day was the festival in the afternoon, and we spent all morning booking accommodation for the last week or so of our trip. We did go out for lunch, hoping to treat ourselves, but were left sorely disappointed by my pre-packaged microwave meat pancakes, and Chelsea's Indian dish, which was quite clearly different to what she had ordered. Chels did get a nice Mojito though and it was quite cheap, so it wasn't a complete waste!
On our final day we decided to just wander around the city, we took the tram out to save our legs, and then walked around getting a feel for the city. We spent a while locating a Budapest pin to join Chelsea's growing collection and strolled in and out of shops, stopping for a nice slice of pizza, and ate ice creams sitting by a pretty and popular water feature, dangling our feet into the cooling water. That evening, we headed back out, determined to have a good meal out in Budapest, and we were not disappointed. Gotti was seemingly staffed solely by one short, fat waiter, who spoke little English, but tried very hard to accommodate us. We sat outside at a lovely candle-lit table, electing to share our dishes, we enjoyed a traditional Hungarian beef stew with dumplings, and a delicious crispy duck with red cabbage and mashed potato, confirming that despite his positive response, the waiter had not understood a word of my request to swap the mash for some crispy potato wedges! Chelsea enjoyed a nice glass of wine, while I stuck to beer, surprised by its lemony taste which appeared to be a common style in Hungary. It was a wonderful meal, more than making up for our disappointment the day before.
We are both noticing something of a drop in our energy levels, and are looking forward to a chilled out and culture-free stay in Bled!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.069s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 7; qc: 44; dbt: 0.0384s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Sue
non-member comment
Fab
Fab read again Tom I can picture you both in your Flip Flops getting squashed. Look forward to Bled