It’s almost impossible to top Day One in Budapest, but there’s a lot left on my list to see and do. Since it’s another overcast day we decided to stay on this side of the Danube river and save the views of Buda for tomorrow. This place used to be two cities: Buda, the hills on one side of the river and Pest, the flatlands on the opposite bank, until they joined back in 18 hundred and something or other to form Budapest (pronounced “Pesht”).
We slept in again — the sun isn’t rising until about 7:30. Perfect for a relaxing vacation and such a nice break from home where the sun rises at 6 am even on the short days of December. Thank God for Josh who has been making breakfast for everyone before I’ve even opened my eyes.
After breakfast we headed out to the large market right around the corner from our house. Gorgeous displays of vegetables, cheeses and meats and magnets, potholders, gloves, and t-shirts that say things like “Communism is a party,” and any other tchotchkes you can think of branded with “Budapest” or “Hungry for Hungary.”
Since I was having second thoughts about my lack of layers, we stopped back by the house where chaos ensued — we are staying in an apartment with a code for the front door and of course everyone fights over who gets to input the stupid code. I don’t even know the code myself since one of the kids has done it every time since we’ve arrived. I’ll be locked out in the cold if they ever aren’t with me. Anyway, tears and fighting over the dumb code and threats to leave them at the apartment because they are ruining my vacation happened, but we finally got things worked out and instituted a ban on two particular children not being allowed to have contact with each other for the rest of the day.
We set out again for the metro and on our way to our first stop Josh made a new friend. A guy was promoting tours and Josh asked him where he was from because he could hear that he spoke English with an Arabic accent. He was from Tunisia and then he and Josh chatted in Arabic on the street corner until Josh could pull away.
We went to St. Stephen’s church, known for having a mummified hand of St. Stephen that sounded a lot more interesting than it was in real life. The church was huge and beautiful and ornate, all red marble and gold, but a bit strange because the main statue/sculpture up front was Stephen himself (not Stephen from the Bible, a different one) and all the areas to pay tribute to Jesus were off on the sides.
Anyway, the best part of the church was our hike to the top — round and round and round up a million steps and then coming out on the turret that surrounds the main dome, looking out over the roofs of Budapest. Amazing views, even through the mist.
After a short break we headed over to the Parliament building. Yes, it was a hike, but I wanted to see the river so we walked down toward the water and the Chain Bridge. Caleb had to stop and see if the lions really were missing their tongues (from Hannah’s Cold Winter — they are!) and then we walked down the river to the HUGE Parliament building.
Josh got tickets and we had about an hour so we went around the corner to grab lunch at a cozy cafe.
The tour lasted about 45 minutes and it was gold, more gold, long hallways, gold ceilings . . . lots of gold. All the gold that is overhead and out of reach is actually gold — the bits that are down low are paint.
Since we were on an opulent roll, we decided to walk over to the opera house to see if there were any tickets left for the Nutcracker. They’ve been sold out for months, but I wanted to see if anyone had canceled and turned some in to be resold.
No such luck. But the building itself is beautiful, gold leafed, and worth a visit. No more tours for us today though. Too tired.
We opted to walk up the street to the Alexandra bookstore and cafe to rest our feet. Hot chocolates and cappuccinos for everyone with live piano music and gold painted mirrors and ceilings. super fancy. If it seems that we are drinking our way through Budapest, that’s because we are. If we’re not stopping for coffee, it’s to fill our cups with some hot wine. It’s freezing here.
We headed home to warm up and grab dinner. We tried to go to one restaurant on our street, but it was booked with a party so Bob pointed out a pub a few doors down that looked interesting. We went in and had some comfort food — goulash, pickles, red wine and sweet crepes for dessert.
(We walked over 10 miles today!)