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Published: April 12th 2017
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Sunday- Wednesday: Budapest
After seeing Parkway drive at Brixton O2 on the Saturday night (Who were INCREDIBLE!!) Me and Jamie woke up at 7am sharp to start our European Adventure! First, we had to navigate our way around the deep dark depths of the London Underground to get to Stansted. Upon our arrival, we went straight through security to the Spoons to collect our obligatory Eggs Benedict and Pint of Heineken before boarding the first flight out to the first stop on our tour... BUDASESH (Budapest to the non-alcoholics amongst us...). As we stepped on the tarmac, our first impressions of Hungary were not the best, as it was about 10 degrees colder than Stansted! However, we ventured through the airport to our bus, then to the metro to our accommodation for the next 3 nights, the Fifth Hostel, just on the edge of the Jewish quarter of the city. When we arrived, we were greeted by a lovely man named Pierre, the owner of the hostel. He sat down with us, got a map out, and showed us every single place in the city to visit... I mean EVERY PLACE! Pubs, Clubs, Restaurants, What to Drink, what to see!
He was great! And it's fair to say, everyone of Pierre's suggestions were top notch! Apart from the bar crawl... something we will discuss later.
One place he had suggested was the Red Ruin bar, about a 15 minute walk from our accommodation. It had 50 Hungarian Craft beers, and we got 20% off!! Pierre... MY MAN! Me and minx took a stroll down to the bar. Just as we got to the door, a man exited the pub with his two small dogs, a sausage dog and a white Shih-tzu. Both small and sweet, until the white ship-tzu started barking at me. And jumping. And then clawing my leg. And then trying to rip my knee caps off. This was the moment I realised he wasn't trying to be friendly, but was actually looking at my meaty leg as a big Denta-Stick, and initiating a new found fear of Hungarian dogs.
Anyway, inside we were greated by a man who offered all kinds of advice on the beers they had to offer. I wanted something slightly darker, so got a Black IPA, whilst he offered minx something more light and larger like, A Belgian Trip. The bottles
were handed over, and it was 1700 forreint... (about £6). Not too bad for two beers in the City centre! Until we realised, these weren't any Hungarian craft beers, but they were however 7.5% and 10% ABV. I swear, Jamie nearly fell to the floor when he read it! Light and smooth was the description, but by the looks of the bottle, it was full of LSD! This didn't stop us then asking the man for the 11% New Zealand hoppy beer to follow. We spent a little while longer and a lot more money trying a variety of beers, until we inevitably had to leave the pub to walk back to the hostel, slightly drunk, but still stopping at a few more bars along the way. This is when we discovered that the general draught beer was only 350 forrient... basically 98p. You can imagine the amazement in our eyes when we realised this!
Anyway, we woke up the next morning ready for a day full of walking around on our guided tours, the first of which was at 10:30. We woke up around 7:00, with the taste of last nights beer still looming, and did what any
good Northampton Uni Student does after an alcohol filled night out... that's right, Maccies Breakfast. After a bacon and Egg muffin of some sort, we began to walk to meet our tour guide for the first tour. I felt top notch, Jamie however looked like he was on a come down from his possibly drug infused alcohol stint. We met our guide, Ursula, in the centre of the city, before we wondered around the city for the next 2 hours seeing all the main sites and hearing the short, but amazing history of Hungary. We walked to the top of the Palace hill and saw amazing sites, before finishing the tour with a slightly awkward song from Ursula to the group. We then wandered around the upper area of the Buda side of the city, stopping for lunch and an amazing Hungarian cream cake. Much to Minx's disgust, I also got us both a beer to help settle his still very active hangover. He wasn't best impressed!
We made our way back to the main part of the city to have our second tour, again led by Ursula, around the Jewish Quarter of the city, looking at all the
synagogues and memorials. By this time, we were back on top form, and were ready for another drink and to see some more sites of Budapest!
One of the suggestions we were given was the 'amazing' "Backpacker Bar crawl". Sounds great doesn't it?... that's what we thought! So back to the hostel we went to get ready for the evening and the chaos that was about to begin. €10 each for 5 bars, with a shot and a beer at each place... don't have to be amazing at maths to say that's a good deal! Off we go, jeans and Vans on, ready to show Buda-Sesh how the brits do it. We got to the first bar, Akvarium, which was the meeting point for the crawl. There were 4 of the organisers there with a sign on a wooden board. We were clearly the first there. That's not a problem, it's meeting between 8 and 9. They give us a token to get our first beer at this club and took some details on some paper, then say to meet them at 9. We asked them how many people usually turn up, they reluctantly said "Ummm, depends, usually 10-20". Didn't seem positive, but we had a beer token to use, so made our way to the bar. We spent the next hour wondering if anyone had turned up, why were they reluctant to say how many people turned up. We went back to them at 9, to a very empty clipboard which still only read the names Dan and Jamie. Therefore, they couldn't do the tour with only 2 people, so it was cancelled. They gave us a map and showed us some places to go, and joked how "well atleast you got a free beer here!". We laughed and walked off, until we both realised that no, we hadn't had a free beer, we had paid €10 each for 1 beer! Needless to say, we will be claiming it back! Venturing into the nightlife of the Jewish Quarter, we visited the second best Ruin Bar in the city, Szimpla. It was an amazing bar, however, it still possessed a slight resemblance to the faultless NB's. After a few more pints and the necessary Doner Kebab on route to the hostel, Day 2 was over.
Our final full day in the amazing Budapest was here so we had to see all the bits we had left. We woke up around 8, to the polite courtesy text from the "Backpacker Barcrawl" to ask how our experience of the evening was. They are yet to get a reply.
We ventured 28km around the city, seeing the Basillica, Hero's Square, Parliament, the Shoes on the Danube, the Great Market hall and loads of other amazing places. We then decided to conquer the hill in the south west of the city, which housed the Citadel and Liberty Statue (not the Statue of Liberty as previously confused us...). This was a huge hill over looking the whole of Budapest which we decided would look incredible in the sunset and night. We took an amazing walk to the top and had a few drinks as we watched the sun go down me the city light up. After a full photo shoot for us both at the top and a congratulatory beer, we started our walks back down to the bottom for a beer before bed.
We went off to sleep ready for our train Journey to Vienna today. Well, I went to sleep. Jamie sat up till 3am due to me getting a cold at the top of the hill and snoring so loud he thought he was at the Download Mainstage all night...
We were up early, handed our keys back to Pierre, and made our way to the station, boarded our train are on our way.
Next stop Vienna! ??????
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