We have a tour schedules tomorrow but wanted to cover some stuff on our own and if we got back, at least we’ll get the history and background information tomorrow.
Our first stop was St. Stephens Basilica. It was an enormous and gorgeous church and in a very busy square. First things first, climb it for a fantastic panoramic view of the city. It wasn’t a difficult climb and we were able to see a lot of the city and get a better vantage point to see how it’s laid out. After doing that, we wanted to head to a funicular at the top of Castle Hill. To get there we walked across the Széchenyi Bridge. It was like a bootleg Brooklyn Bridge and since we were walking along the side, it was hard to get a good view. It wasn’t too long of a bridge, but looked like such a pain to drive across as it was only one lane each day. Once there, we decided that instead of taking the funicular up and having to walk to the other places we had planned to see, we booked a ticket for a little castle shuttle that made four stops along the way for us to get off, walk around, then get back on another one.
From this shuttle, our first stop was the stunning Matthias Church and Fisherman’s Bastion. The buildings themselves and their views were amazing. We walked the grounds a little, but knew we’d be back so we hopped back on the shuttle to the next stop. This one, the Buds Tower was a little underwhelming so we took a quick look and waited for another shuttle. Our third stop was Buda Castle and the Royal Palace. Again, these grounds were so large and so pretty. The architecture itself was beautiful, and once again, so were the views from here. At this point in the day, we were getting hot and hungry. We hadn’t eaten since breakfast so we grabbed a quick ice cream cone to help tide us over, but we were really starting the drag. We had one more stop, the Castle Garden Bazaar, which we walked a little of, then had to walk across the bridge again to sit down and eat somewhere. On the way there we had walked down Zrínyi street and it had some cute, albeit touristy restaurants. We figured we’d eat at one of those, but we were not in the mood for heavy and hot food so we walked a bit more and sat down for some sandwiches. They were good enough, but definitely not to cover for lunch and dinner.
Finally, our last tourist stop for the day was to see the Bronze Shoe Memorial on the Danube and then hit the Parliament. I had seen pictures of this memorial from my parents when they came here last summer, but I forgot all the history of it, so will have to look up some more details. I know it had to do with Jews being killed during WW2, but I want to read up more on it.
Near this memorial was the Parliament building. This building was absolutely magnificent. I was struck by its architecture (gothic style maybe?) and sheer size. For whatever reason, it wasn’t that crowded at all and we were able to get some great pictures. We walked the full 360 around the building and even just sat and looked at it for a while. Randomly, we heard drums and saw the guards all line up and at first we thought it might be another changing of the guards, but it was time to take down the Hungarian flag and they do this in a very proper and rigid way, which was neat to see. We enjoyed the exterior of the Parliament so much, we knew we wanted to get a tour of the inside. My mom said they couldn’t get tickets when she was here so my friend and I wanted to make sure and secure some.
We walked back to our hotel, talked again with the front desk and were able to get the last two tickets to 9:00 am tour on Sunday. We have a tour of the whole city tomorrow at 9 so couldn’t do it then and there was nothing available all day, either day after 9. Sigh.
Our last adventure of the night was to head to an area Gozsud Udvar. There were a ton of bars and restaurants (and hot bouncer and security guards) and people our age walking around. We will def be heading back here for food and/or a night out before we leave Budapest.
For a half first day here, we certainly saw a lot and tried to solidify our plan for the next two days here. I think we got it figured out and as usual, we plan to take this city by storm.
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