Walking Along the Blue Danube

If Budapest isn't on your list of places to visit, you should add it immediately. We had such an amazing time in this city! The city is actually divided into two parts, the Buda, which is the hilly section on the west side of the Danube, and the Pest, which stretches out east from the river. Our flat was on the west side, in the shadow of the Buda Castle. Our first morning in Budapest we set out to explore, and walked up the steps to the Buda Castle. What a view! The castle itself is impressive, but the view from the castle over the river is breathtaking. We strolled down and walked across the Cable Bride to the Pest side of the city to the Central Market. Since we had a flat with a full kitchen instead of our usual hotel type accomadation we thought we would take advantage of the opportunity and cook ourselves a home cooked meal. The Central Market was a shopping experience. It is like the biggest farmers market you have ever seen. Meet vendors line the center aisles, each with a specialty, i.e. beef, pork, etc. Lining the sides you find stalls with fruits, vegetables, and spices, and in the front, the bakery with all the bread and pastries that you could ever want. Feeling a little overwhelmed we decided to fall back on a Hungarian favorite, goulash. We found a spice pack and recipe and gathered the rest of our ingredients, then with our hands full of packages headed home. We also stopped at a regular grocery store for snacks, thinking that maybe the Central Market was more of a tourist thing. It is not. The grocery stores only have a VERY small selection of meat, bread and produce. Hungarians only purchase these items at the grocery in case of emergencies, and still do most of their shopping in the market setting.
Aside from Buda Castle, the city of Budapest is dotted with many architectural treasures and monuments. The streets are tree lined and clean, the people are incredibly friendly and very proud of their city. It rivals Paris in it's beauty, and the price tag is much friendlier to the American Dollar.
Another thing that you can't miss in Budapest is the baths. They are fabulous! They have many public bath houses located throughout the city. We went to one of the larger ones in City Park. You pay an entrance fee and then you have five hours to explore the baths, saunas, and steam rooms. The baths are kept at different temperatures, so you can find the one that suites you, or you can hop around. Some are medicinal, some are just heated. They also offer massages and mud baths for an additional charge. The whole day cost just $24 for both of us, and we left feeling relaxed, refreshed, and ready for our train ride to Munich.

Budapest