Let's take this one city at a time...BUDAPEST

Alright, first things first...I don't have as many pictures from Budapest because my camera died the first day we had our tours and such but luckily I had my battery charger with me so I continued the next day. Anywho, I just have to get pictures from that first day from a few friends so keep watch for a Budapest part II in the upcoming weeks.

Also, these next three posts are really long, so you may have to click on the 'Older posts' link at the bottom of the page to see all of them...Budapest, Vienna, and Prague!

We arrived in Budapest (pronounced Budapescht because the "s" makes a "sch" sound in Hungarian) late Sunday night on March 9th. Our plane was delayed 2 hours so we received a $15 voucher to spend at the airport and a free drink aboard! We stayed at Hotel Hungarian, which was a Best Western and had an amazing breakfast buffet! Here's our view from the hotel window:


Our Monday started out with a tour on foot and by bus from our guide, Gerda, who was a cute lady that always tried to make things easier for us. For example, in introducing herself she told us that if her name was too hard to say we could call her "G, like Gangster" ...from that moment I knew if was going to be a good tour :)

First stop, Hero's square. This large plaza celebrates important figures in Budapest's history...the two things Gerda told us to remember were King Stephen and the number 96. Stephen was the guy who made Budapest what it is and most buildings are 96 meters tall...



...including this column.


Right before the battery went dead I was able to get some shots of the gorgeous Medieval Castle Hill. This is one of the oldest areas of Budapest and is still in great condition. This particular part is called Fisherman's Bastion; Budapest used to be a large resource for fish. I was all about the angles when taking pictures here.




And, across the river lies Parliament, which is huge! Budapest used to be 3 different cities divided by the river: Buda was on this side of the river and Pest was on the other side where Parliament is. Obuda was northwest of the two until 1873 when the three combined to form Budapest. Still today they differentiate between sides of the river by saying either the Buda or the Pest side.



























Unfortunately, under scaffolding lies Matias' church...with a gorgeous tile roof atop.



And that's where the camera dies for Monday, March 10th...later that day we went to the Market place, around a large park and got cotton candy and checked out Matias' castle (he's a former king of Hungary) and then the Baths! Budapest has about 4 separate bath locations where public baths took place. They used to be open to males and females on separate days back in the day, but now you see men, women, and every shape and size...I saw much more than I ever intended to there! It was so relaxing though, there are a bunch of indoor pools, but we headed to the outdoor pools that were set at a perfect temperature. There were fountains, and people playing chess in the water.

Next, we joined up with the group again for a dinner of Broccoli soup, Chicken with Peach on it, and a cheeseball thing with strawberry syrup drizzled on top. It wasn't an awful dessert, but it definitely wasn't as appetizing as the chocolate cream pie we saw other tables being served! During dinner, we were given a song and dance show that will be shown in the anticipated Budapest II post as soon as I get the pictures!

Other places we visited were the House of Terror, an aesthetically pleasing museum that has recently been created showing life under Nazi reign. The house was the actual Nazi headquarters and was where many were tortured. Talk about a history lesson! Unfortunately, no pictures were allowed but I can confidently say that it was the most involved museum I've been too that pulls you along from room to room wondering what you're going to encounter next.


This is the 2nd largest synagogue in the World, and the largest in Europe. (The largest is in NYC). We were given a tour of this and also taken to the Jewish museum in here. I learned and still continue to learn a lot about Jewish culture as many people in this program are Jewish.


No matter how many times I had this sweet bread's name said to me I couldn't remember it much less pronounce it! DIS gave us pieces of this sweet bread that is flattened and then wound around a wide metal rod and cooked over open fire with a glaze on it and either left with just the glaze or dipped in sugar or coconut. We were told it was a traditional Hungarian bread, but they were selling like hotcakes at the market in Prague so who knows where the true origin of this bread lies...none the less, delicious. And by the way, Garrett really isn't grumpy like he looks, he just tries to tough in pictures...maybe to make up for his lack of strength in real life :)


This is the inside of the synagogue:


And, the tree of life. Built as a memorial for the mass amount of Jews lost during the Holocaust. I didn't realize Hungary was hit so hard by the Holocaust...of 800,000 Jews who were living there 600,000 were killed. The small willow leaves on the tree are donated by families who lost loved ones during those times.


And our last night there, I was invited to a Hungarian opera by Melanie (to my right in the sweet bread picture). She booked tickets ahead of time and we lucked out in getting moved up to front row because it wasn't a full house. The opera was in Czech and the subtitles on the LCD screen were in Hungarian...so we had no idea what was going on except that there were two men, one woman, a baby and some sort of witch lady involved. It was my first opera and the opera house was gorgeous as you can see by the pictures.




















A few other tid-bits from Budapest: the city hosts the oldest metro in continental Europe. There is an older on in England but since it's an island Budapest gets claim to the oldest in the continental countries. Also, Magyer means Hungarian in Hungarian.