Budapest - day two

---

Kraków was a fun and interesting town but Budapest is definitely a level above. This is a big city with a rich history and a lot to offer visitors. I would not say that Budapest is necessarily better but it has more to see and do.

Our second full day here in Budapest was good. This morning we took the tram from near our hotel to the Parliament but were disappointed that the next available entry tickets were two hours later. So that meant we had to just stay outside to enjoy the scene and the fine weather. The architect was apparently inspired by the British Parliament and you can certainly see the similarities. The surrounding buildings are almost as fancy and it was another reminder that this town has an illustrious history.

Just along from the Parliament on the banks of the Danube was a sculpture called The Shoes which commemorates the killing of Jews by fascist militia during 1944-45. The shoes relate to the victims being told to remove their shoes before being shot and falling into the Danube.

Next stop was Hard Rock Cafe for the next hurricane glass in our already-large collection of hurricane glasses. Things were going on track until the waiter delivered the bad news was the they had sold out of those glasses over the F1 weekend. So the collection is now 26ish hurricane glasses and one marguerita glass.

This afternoon we decided that dealing with the extreme heat would be easier in a swimming pool so we headed to the "thermal baths" at the nearby Gellert hotel. There are several of these thermal baths in Budapest. I'm not sure what we expected but what we got was described by Sandra as Tooting Lido! It was perhaps a little posher than that, with multiple pools of varying temperatures, inside and outside, along with a sauna and a wave pool but there were thousands of other people there also trying to beat the heat so it didn't feel all that special. But the cool water did the job and kept us from frying.

A big chunk of the evening was spent at the local train station where we had to go to reserve seats for tomorrow's train ride to Vienna. The process was horribly slow....take a number and wait outside the ticket office with a hundred other people until called. Our number was about 90 ahead of the number on the screen and there were only 3 open desks. I noticed one of the security guards was flicking through a wad of money and I was already considering adding to his cash collection when he offered me with a ticket number many places ahead of ours. I was ready to hand over the florints but was surprised when he refused. Humanity is ok after all, and we have train seats together.

A late last supper in Hungary with some local grub including paprika chicken and goulash. Yum!

---