Budapest - like Vienna, only less so

Budapest was a lovely city, but our experience there started on a rough note - we pulled in at 8pm without a hostel booked, and everything closes early there - tourist information and most things around the train station were closed by then. We ended up finding a super-cheap hostel right by the train station, but it wasn't great (the guy running the place was really jumpy, the shower I took was cold, no window in our room, room was connected to another room with a wall that didn't go to the ceiling, so it was loud). After checking in we tried to get dinner, but everything near the station was closed and the locals generally looked suspicious.

We started the following morning at the top, at Heroes Square and the park surrounding it.

Then we went to the main area, B3 on the local map, near the Opera House. The was almost not at all mentioned in Lonely Planet Eastern Europe, whereas the local tourist information maps focus on it as the heart of the city. Lonely Planet loses this match.

Here's a fat guy in that area, next to a statue. The view is up Andressy St, a UNESCO world heritage site ending at Heroes Square.

Budapest is cool because it's split in two parts (Buda, with the castle, and Pest, with everything else) by the Danube river, so walking along the river we can see the skyline to half the city, including

Buda Castle

Parliament (basically a white Big Ben)

The Four Seasons we didn't stay at

and more



In the castle complex (which was big, but with no dominating castle-shaped building) we saw an outdoor performance of Hungarian dances by young dancers,

On the way home - here is St Stephens church by night -- that night was the bluest night sky I've seen, and it's captured fairly well (though a bit grainily) in this pic