Hungary

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Hey guys,

After we returned to Munich from Croatia, Mark and Kris headed back to the States for a bit. Matt and I were hanging out in Wombat's, great hostel near the train station, and were trying to come up with some travel plans. Luckily, he happened to find a good deal on a train to Budapest, Hungary. On a whim, we bought the tickets for three days in advance and decided that we would go to Budapest, hang out for a few days, and then go backpacking in an area of the Carpathian mountains in the north of the country, near the Slovakian border for a few days. We booked hostels for three nights in Budapest and left all the other details up in the air.

When we first arrived in Budapest we had some trouble finding our hostel because another one with the exact same name was right down the street. Our reservation wasn't on the books at the first place we went to, but luckily, the owner pointed us in the direction of our actual one. Our "hostel" was definitely the worst place that Matt and I have ever stayed. There were eight beds crammed into one small room, along with a bathroom, and a pitiful excuse for a kitchen. We did our laundry in the sink and then realized that there weren't any windows for ventilation, and when we hung everything up to dry it not only remained wet, but made the humidity of the room about 100%. The next day we walked all over the town and met a barista, Ester, who we took out to dinner that night. She had a been an exchange student in Australia and spoke really good English.

After two nights in Budapest, we caught a bus to Eger, which was a beautiful city in the center of Hungary's wine country. It is famous for it's Bull's Blood Wine and baroque architecture. They call it Bull's Blood because of a famous battle that took place in the 16th century. The Turks were invading Hungary, and a fortress (the fortress is still there) with 800 Hungarian soldiers held back an army of 20,000 Turks. The Turks attacked again five years later an won, but they said that the Hungarians must have had bull's blood in their veins to be able to fight so well. From Eger we tried to hike through the mountains to a town called Repashuta, where we would spend the night and hike on the next day to another town, Lillafured. It turns out that the trails, although numerous, aren't really marked, and we ended up getting thoroughly lost, running out of water, and walking around 25 miles before finally finding a bus stop beside a road. We had missed the only bus of the day by an hour, so we hitchhiked back to the town that we started from and took the bus to Lillafured the next day.

Lillafured is a really small town nestled in the mountains, and it's famous for a 250 meter deep cave. We looked around town that afternoon and checked out the cave the next day, before catching a bus back to Eger. The next day we headed back to Budapest, and it happened to be the biggest national holiday of the year where they celebrate the crowning of their first Christian king, St. Istvan. We went to the famous Turkish baths and hung out with some English tourists. There was a huge fireworks show on the Danube that night, and hundreds of thousands of people were all crowded on the banks to watch. We caught the train back to Munich the next day, and Matt was flying back to the States to visit a friend shortly thereafter. I still had about ten days to kill before my Summer program at the German university started, so I went back to Wombat's to make new plans...

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Photos

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View of the Oktagon-sort of the central part of Pest (the half of Budapest on the East side of the Danube)

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Matt was laughing at how crappy the "hostel" was

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View of the "hostel" from the outside. That's a tattoo parlor on the right.

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Apparently there are NASCAR fans everywhere. This one got a parking ticket.

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This is the street where all the embassies were

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Me in front of the Square of Heroes. On the day before the big national holiday, this square was turned into a huge stage, and this massive musical was performed on it. It was a reenactment of the conquest of the Hungarian barbarians by the first king. Apparently his uncle was the leader of the barbarian tribes, and Istvan visited Rome to get the blessing of the Pope to invade and Christianize everyone. We only watched the show on TV because we were still in Eger, but it was really well done, with pyrotechnics, horses, and hundreds of dancers.

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National theater

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Park

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This was the entrance to a castle that was converted into a museum

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Inside the castle walls

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The famous Turkish baths

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This gazebo played music when you walked by it. It was kind of scary.

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Fountain on Margaritsziget, an island in the middle of the Danube

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The Hungarian parliament building is one of the most impressive buildings I've ever seen.

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Kossuth was one of the first Hungarians to promote Hungary's independence from the Austrian empire in the mid 1800s. This memorial is right in front of the parliament building.