Day 20: Budapest

Today we crossed the Danube to go and visit Buda, starting with Buda castle. This is the more architecturally magnificent side of the city and is largely on an elevation, so also provides great views looking back east towards Pest.

This is Alex sweltering under the sun. The temperature was about 29degC (very conducive to climbing and long walks!), which was very warm for us, but we managed reasonably well. Who knew it would get even hotter as we went south into the Balkans.

Rarrrgh!!......Whatever.!!

The competition for the largest Lions in Europe goes to Skopje in North Macedonia, but these guys are also very cool.

This is Mathias' church near the Fisherman's bastion, the white stone juxtaposed against the cloudless blue sky is quite the site.

The Fisherman's bastion is a UNESCO heritage site, whose neo-Romanesque style is in stark contrast to the Baroque style of Buda castle. The views of the city are particularly good from here. It is a really beautiful part of the city. The placing of stands to sell drinks and trinkets to tourists is definitely not in keeping with the aesthetic though.

There was also a dude here with a giant eagle that you could hold for a few thousand forints.

This is a picture of my sister Amy and Dad near the Fisherman's bastion 20yrs ago.

We found this lovely shaded area at the bottom of the steps down from the Fisherman's bastion. A temporary respite from the sun was definitely in order.

The sun was insistent on making an appearance in all our photos while in Buda. Wrong time of the day I suppose.

This is a view of the Hungarian parliament buildings looking across the Danube from Buda, better working environment than a portacabin by a long shot.

Dad tells me that this was once called "Bushing", I don't see the appeal myself, it smells like a cat's restroom here, peeuw!!.

On the way back to our apartment we stopped at a nice restaurant near the Danube and had lunch. I don't remember exactly what we had, except that it was very nice. Most notable though was the cholate mousse with the gold leaf on top. Alex is quite thrilled to have eaten gold.

Later that night we went to a Tapas bar to have dinner, very meh!!, This is their patatas bravas. We also continued our search for the world's most expensive Negroni.

We were both thoroughly enjoying Budapest and decided that we needed to stay an extra day. Dad rang the apartment manager, but he did not have availability for the following day and so we had to book another apartment just for that night. Fortunately it was just around the corner.