Hungary Aug 08

Budapest

As we were arriving late at night from our London flight, we pre-booked a double room in the hostel Id stayed in some seven years ago. I was initially up for sleeping in the garden, as we had last time, but decided to suss the place out first. Prices seemed to have increased somewhat since I was last here and the daily budget was looking tight from day one, so after 2 nights in the room, we moved out to the relaxing garden decked out with hammocks, a Mongolian yurt (tent), a little fish pond and a garden percoda, where we chose to sleep for the rest of our time there. Funnily enough, we were the only people who chose to stay out there without a tent... I guess we are fitting the Aussie backpacker stereotype nicely.

The 1st morning we headed into town on foot and after 20mins we came upon the mighty Danube River, which separates Buda from Pest. The embankment is a site to behold, with magnificent historical buildings lining the river, several bridges spanning the river, a castle high on the hill and several statues, monuments and churches speckling the skyline. We began with a visit to a church in a cave, over 1000 years old! Then we climbed the steep hill to the citadel, where we were afforded sweeping views over the bustling city. We then went underground into the WWII Nazi air raid bunker and museum of the old fort. In short, this fort was the strong point of the town that only fell when a ruling power was overthrown by the next dynasty, Celts, Romans, Magyars, Turks, Habsburgs, Nazis, and then Russians. So there was a fair bit of history to read about. The rest of the day was spent wandering about Pest, up to Parliament, a magnificent building that had recently been restored to its former glory shining on the river's embankment.

We ended the day over a beer in the central park on the city's Margaret island, where beer and food stalls were lined up. A favorite find was the performing fountain that spurted water in time to classical music, with powerful surges of water spurting as the music crescendoed.. It was actually very good!

The next day we met Csilla and Rudy, Hungarian friends from Sydney, who were visiting their homeland. They took us further around the city, on a well-planned out itinerary, taking us to a Photography exhibition on ethnicity in Europe, alfresco dining along a cafe strip where we tasted the Hungarian cuisine, the Terror (Communism) Museum, which was very tastefully done and quite chilling, Heroes Square - a monument to Hungarys founders and finest contributers to the nation and then a visit to a lovely little castle nearby. We finished by catching the oldest underground railway system in continental Europe (second only to London in all of Europe) and back to the park for beer, sausage and pancakes to finish off the evening.

Hungarys history is rich and makes you realise just how young Colonial Australia really is. Budapest has been under constant struggle over the centuries, signifying its strategic importance. It was destroyed and rebuilt time and time again, after the Mongol and Turkish invasions and most recently during WWII, where 40% of all of its buildings and 100% of its bridges were demolished. Furthermore, through redistribution of land over the years, Hungary has lost much of its former land, at one point losing 2/3 of its land and ¾ of its population! At the end of the 19th century, the ruling Austrian Habsburgs did a fine job of building a fantastic classical style city centre. This old city remains in central Budapest and retains much of this era's charm... A few blocks away, the new (ugly) buildings have sprung up, but you rarely see these parts.

Eger

Eger cannot go untold......a small town in the northeast of Hungary with an ancient castle bearing down on it. It was also wine country where the *Valley of the Beautiful Women* was the place you went to taste the local produce.

Upon arrival in the early afternoon, we set off to find tourist info to source some accommodation for the night. Reaching the main street, a little old lady approached us speaking in Magyar. When we didn't understand, she switched to German, which we were at least able to recognise a little of. We worked out she was offering us her spare room so we followed her the short distance to her penthouse apartment. Now when I say penthouse, I am merely referring to the top floor of the building for this place was by no means fancy, however it had a homely feel to it, was clean and comfortable and we quickly agreed. On our first night we dined under the castle that was lit up at night, trying more of their traditional food and a little of the wine.....the quality of which was nothing to write home about.

So after exploring the town the next morning, I (Mandy) decided that I should try and get a wax.  This was an interesting experience, as none of the staff spoke any English.  They were extremely helpful though after I made waxing motions on my leg to indicate what I was after.  They understood and fetched the wax lady who arrived for some more charades.  She got a ¨menu¨ card and pointed out - with actions - what each of the items were....and when I motioned to my bikini, she pointed it out as well.  Done!!  So off we went into the little room out the back and the next 20 minutes was a woman to woman conversation in two different languages that neither of the other understood.  The results were successful though....and a bargain at that!!

We then set off on the 20 minute walk to the Valley of the Beautiful Women. Approaching town from a hill, we found that the cellar doors were nothing like that of Australia, in fact each place was lined up side by side, each one only a few metres wide. Inside was a unique experience, from an underground cave, Bavarian style hall and stylish bar. The bars were lined up in a horseshoe shape surrounding a park, and seeing as there were so many (after several glasses), we knew that there was no way to try each and every one. Mark then devised a plan that involved tossing a coin, however, even half of all of them would still be too many, so the rules were that you had to get two heads to go in. We amused and disappointed the salesmen at the front of the skipped cellars.

As luck would have it, at about winery number 5 we ran into 2 American girls, the first English we had heard for a couple of days. We sat down and shared a wine with them and we soon told them our story about the one year honeymoon adventure we were on. They were then quite adamant about buying us wine for the rest of the afternoon and joined in the coin toss game. I'm afraid that didn't last long however as the next bar served full glasses of wine for around AU$0.60....and when I say glass, I don´t just mean a wine glass, but a full tall glass!!! So after two more of those, the American girls were ready for a break and decided to lay in the park for a bit. Not before the bar staff ran out with a bucket after one of the girls went to the bathroom... They were trying to convince us to go in after her to clean up....but things hadn´t got that far...slight miscommunication....

Mark and I continued our game, stealing the leftover bread off a nearby table to soak up all the wine in our bellies, to the amusement of the adjacent Swedes who gave us another wine on their way out..just what we needed....

We then met some locals, who had come to the park for their Saturday night. They were cooking food over the fire pits and as they spoke English, we joined their group. The Americans left soon after but Mark and I managed to stick around until we had officially been drinking for 8 ½ hours straight before I had to put Mark into a taxi and get him home to bed.

Needless to say the next day was a little rough, though I (Mandy) managed to wake up hangover-free. Mark on the other hand..... well all I can say is that I'm glad that we left the litre of wine behind that Mark had decided to buy at around 10pm......

Next stop Slovakia >