Travel: Danube cruise 2010

We arrived in Budapest Saturday afternoon and spent Sunday morning seeing the city.

Budapest is a lovely city—really two cities—Buda the older part on the hilly side of the river and Pest on the flat side of the river. The tour included the Hero’s Square on the Pest side—a large area with a colonnaded monument featuring statues of Hungarians heroes and other symbolic statues. It was all built in 1896 to commemorate the millennium anniversary of the founding of the city in 896. a broad avenue leads from the river to the square. Beyond the square is a large city park with amusement areas and a spa featuring the natural hot springs that exist in the city.

On the Buda side is on a hill overlooking the river and the Pest part of the city. There is the fisherman’s bastion and the Matthias Church. We could not go into the church, because it was Sunday and services were being held. The bastion offered a great view of the river and the other part of the city. There were some nice shops there too, and Dolores bought a pretty hand embroidered blouse.

The Chain Bridge across the Danube in Budapest. It is a suspension bridge built in 1849. It was knocked into the river in 1945, but the piers were undamaged, so it was rebuilt.

In the afternoon, we opted for a trip by coach to a farm where we saw a demonstration of horsemanship by Hungarian “cowboys.” They ride bareback and control the horses with long whips. They do not beat the horses, but the animals respond to the swinging and cracking of the whips.

We left Budapest Monday morning and headed upriver aboard the Viking Sky.

The Viking Sky. The food and features aboard the vessel were very good.

The next day we were in Bratislava, Slovakia. The country is part of was once Czechoslovakia, and the city is its capital with a population of about 500,000. Both Hungary and Slovakia were liberated by the Soviets at the end of WW II and were behind the Iron Curtain. Slovakia has made the switch to capitalism better than some have. The county is a center for auto manufacturing. VW has three plants there, Renault has one and even the Korean Kia is made in Slovakia. The center of the city that we saw featured a large pedestrian shopping area with churches, civic buildings. and several foreign embassies.

Next, we were off to Vienna. It is a city that you could spend a lot more time in than just one day. However, Viking gave us a full day and we saw a lot. On the morning city tour, we saw many sights and had time to walk in the Inner City area. There we saw St. Stephen’s church, the Winter Palace, and the nearby Opera House. The area was crowded with people walking and shopping in the many stores in the area. in the afternoon, we took the optional tour to the Schönbrunn Palace that was the summer residence of the Hapsburg rulers. It is a gigantic building with acres of formal gardens.

The night program was an optional Mozart and Strauss concert performed by a Viennese orchestra of about 15 pieces. They played favorites from both composers and featured two singers for the opera selections and a pair of dancers.

Wednesday was Dürnstein and Melk. The former is a small picturesque town in the Wachau valley wine region featuring shops for tourists. The feature of the latter is a 900-year-old abbey. It is magnificent, and beautifully decorated in Baroque style.

Dürnstein, a charming little village full of shops for the tourist — but quite nice.

After the walk through Dünstein we attended an Austrian Frühschoppen on the sun deck. Probably the best translation of the word is brunch. It is a small meal consisting of sausages (like large hot dogs) and salted rolls washed down with a light beer. It was not a whole lot to eat and drink, but we were less hungry at lunch time.

We then sailed through the Wachau valley on the way to Melk, where we visited the Benedictine Monastery. It was founded in 1089 and monks have lived and worked there continually for 900-plus years. The current buildings are built in the Baroque style and date from the 18th century.

On Thursday we landed in Linz and took off for an all day excursion to Saltzburg. Like many of the city we saw, Saltzburg goes back to Roman times. It was the center for the mining of salt—hence the name. Today the tourist attractions are Mozart and "The Sound of Music." Mozart was born here and lived part of his life here, although he is also associated with Vienna where he performed and finally died. The city was the location for the movie "The Sound of Music," and we were continually told what Julie Andrews did hear or there. We had a walking tour that took in Mozart’s birthplace and the many city squares and churches. Lunch was on our own and we ate in a restaurant established by an abbey in about 800 A.D. The food was modern.

On Friday we reached Passau in Germany. The city is just barely in Germany, right over the Austrian boarder. The main feature here was the cathedral. In German it is the Dom (sort of like the Italian Duomo). This cathedral is the home of the largest church organ in Europe. It is said to be the largest cathedral organ in the world, but not the largest church organ in the world—whatever that means. We were treated to a concert in a completely full church. Like many of the others, we saw this was decorated in Baroque style. It was very ornate with painted frescos on the ceilings and much gold leaf and carved marble. It was explained by our guide that the lower parts of the columns and the floor are quite plain representing earth and that the higher you get, the more elaborate portending a taste of heaven. We also learned that the Baroque decoration was common because, after the reformation, the Roman Catholic churches were more heavily decorated to attract back the Protestants that had left. The countries we traveled are primarily Catholic. There are more Protestants—mostly Lutheran—in northern Germany.

Here is a slideshow of photos from the trip. You can view them on this page, or click here to see them full-size in a separate window.