Hungarian Baths

Okay, we have been back for ages but we are continuing our play by play posting about our most recent trip. We better hurry up because we have another long weekend coming up soon. I don't really know what I've been doing with my time (besides working and sleeping) because I don't seem to get that much knitting done either. Hmm...

Anyway, while in Budapest, we decided that we needed to check out a bath because the city is on a fault line. So, we consulted our Lonely Planet guide and chose the only one listed that said men and women could come on the same day. The guidebook also said that the Gellert was like taking a bath in a cathedral! So, after the art museum, we headed onto the baths. When we got off the tram, the adventure began.

First, we ended up walking around most of the building because we couldn't find the entrance. We eventually found the entrance. When we walked in, we saw the lines to get tickets and the information booth. We stood in line, looked at the prices, discussed what we were going to do, and then asked a couple questions at the information desk. We then got back in line and I thought of another question and asked it while John waited. Meanwhile, we saw people wandering around in bathrobes and entering from a different entrance. We got our tickets and still didn't really understand what we paid for because you could get treatments such as massage but also there appeared to be different tickets for the warm and cool water areas. They told us that our ticket got us into both. So, we got our ticket and then handed them to the person checking them. He told us to both go the same way. No word on where the changing rooms were. We eventually found where to get towels and they told us where each changing area was (hallway to change into). Eventually, we got changed and then met up and found a bath. In that room, there is one cool water and one warm water pool.

After being done with these two pools, we decided to wander around a bit because we thought that there had to be more. And there was. We found two more pools. One was warmer than the other and we went into the warmer one and relaxed. We stayed in this pool until our fingers were all shriveled. Then we wandered some more and decided that was all there was for us. I then began my adventure of getting back to my changing area. Luckily for me, a guy noticed that I was confused/lost and told me how to get back to my changing area. After getting changed, we headed out and saw a bunch of people with guidebooks all looking disappointed because the bath stopped allowing in visitors before it closed...

Oh, and this ends the tour of Budapest. Next stop: Vienna

The Statue Park

After visiting the caves, we legged it to the south part of Budapest to go to a statue park, which was my favorite sight of the trip. Basically, the Hungarians seem to have collected the Communist statues that they wanted to get relocate and put them in the statue park in what was probably at one point a fairly rural area. Today, the area is in this sub development of houses.

Upon entering the statue park, grounds, you see a statue of Lenon's boots. You then see all these giant statues performing some type of action. We happened to go on a fairly gloomy day so the sky was dark and the place was almost creepy. If that was creepy enough, if you go into what looks like a temporary structure, you can watch a spy training video. During the rest of the trip, we speculated on who was spying on us. :)

Szemlo-hegyi Cave

While in Budapest, we decided to go visit the Szemlo-hegyi cave because it was the one of two caves in the area that was open. When we got to the cave, the sign on the door said that tours were given on the hour and it was only about half past. We wandered around and looked at the display in the building. We then sat waiting for someone and to come from downstairs. At about 10 minutes before the hour, someone came down, asked if they could help us. We told them we wanted a tour. The person took our money and handed us pamphlets and told us that we could guide ourselves! Why couldn't we have done that 20 minutes earlier???

The cave was discovered in 1930 and was opened to the public in 1986. It has a stable temperature and humidity level and the walls are covered in thick layers of mineral deposits which are unique in Europe. Because of its environment, the air is supposed to be very healthy and people with breathing difficulties come there and sit for a while to feel better. I have to say, it was easy to breath while there and I didn't feel any of my usual sinus congestion...

The cave had an artificial entrance made by miners. It has a series of caves that you wander through. The Ferencvaros Hall is the first group and has growths that are supposed to look like bunches of grapes but I thought it looked more like cauliflower. In the Maria Chamber, there is a hole in wall of the cave. Supposedly, some explorers were in the cave and only this young girl Maria could get through the hole and into the corridor. The other people in the party had to widen the hole in order to get through.

Budapest by night

Seeing as I am blogging instead of knitting my wedding shawl, I will keep posting pictures of our Budapest trip. :) After a full day of sightseeing, we wandered around during the night and since I love taking night shots, we also took many pictures. Usually, John and I shared the gorilla pod. It really makes night shots easier and I think it is my favorite present from Christmas (other than the yarn John got me that will someday become a sweater for me to wear all winter long)...

Buda Labyrinth

Our Lonely Planet guide book said that the Labyrinth in Buda under Castle Hill was expensive by Budapest standards but "good fun." So, we wandered around and finally found the entrance. Since we had gotten the Budapest Card (well worth it), we got a discount on ticket prices and on in we went.

The labyrinth was really "interesting." I think the point was to try to guess what they have been used for during history. There are replica cave drawings on the wall. There are statues around and almost every room had different music piped into it. Towards the end of the "tour," we got to a series of rooms called the "other world." These were by far my favorite. See, the descriptions of the rooms were written in a future perspective looking back on the world today. The world was occupied by homoconsumerists and they led a strange life indeed. Try to identify the pictures of what they put into the display. The first four pictures in this post are not part of the homoconsumerist display. I might even give a prize to anyone (other than John) identifying all the pictures correctly.

The tour ended with a labyrinth of courage (I think that's what it was called). It was completely dark and you had find your way around. Unfortunately, many people in the room kept making their cameras or mobile phones light up so it didn't stay pitch dark.


Edited to make clarification: the last 5 pictures are the ones to be identified and the first person to identify all 5 correctly (other than John) will get a prize. :)

Mátyás király

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The Matthias Church is located on the castle hill in Buda. The exterior was being restored when we visited, but the portions of the roof that have been restored were impressive. I also think the image showing the roof with only a small column of tiles gives an impression of how much work must go into keeping these sort of places in going. The inside of the church is also impressive. It's covered it frescoes that give it a very unique feel. Heidi would probably add that it is also a UNESCO world heritage site, a list that never disappoints.

Halászbástya

John here again. Since Heidi is too busy knitting to post images from our most recent trip, I'm taking over. So the flood of images continues. We flew into Budapest, more accurately Pest, late on Saturday night. We had a wonderful meal that night, veal paprika for me and deep fried camembert for Heidi. The sightseeing got goinng the next day with a visit to the Castle Hill in Buda. First stop the Halászbástya, or Fisherman's Bastion, a sightseeing platform built at the turn of the century. It offers great views of Buda, the Danube and Pest.