Budapest, Hungary

Budapest was one of our favorite cities from our trip. The Danube River divides the two banks of the city, Buda and Pest. Our hotel was located on the Buda side of the river.

Welcome to Hungary

View from our hotel room

The evening that we arrived in Budapest, we walked to the old town part of Buda. We walked through Moscow Square (a public transportation hub) and crossed under the Viennese Gate. We walked along the city wall and saw the National Archives, St. Matthias Church with a statue of St Stephen, and saw a beautiful view of the Danube River and Pest from the Fisherman's Bastion.

Fancy Post Office near Moscow Square

Julie & Phil on top of the city wall

Interestingly colored homes

Several buildings in Budapest had really interesting tiled roofs.

The National Archives

St. Matthias Church

We loved the Fisherman's Bastion. It looks like a sand castle!

Phil & Julie in front of Fisherman's Bastion

Another view of Fisherman's Bastion

Julie & Phil with the Danube and Pest behind

Phil by the statue of St. Stephen

Many of the cities had columns celebrating the defeat of the black plague.

Commemoration of the end of the black plague

The Castle (foreground), which is now used as a museum

Parliament

Bridge connecting Buda and Pest

One of the technicians in Princeton's chemistry department is Hungarian and named Istvan. After years of Julie knowing Istvan, she never knew his name translated to Stephen until we got to Budapest.

The most beautiful church in Budapest is St. Istvan's Cathedral. The inside is gorgeous with lots of marble, gold, and paintings. Phil was particularly impressed with the gold candleabras. The cathedral has a mummified hand of St. Istvan, which is in a glass case on display. It is kept in a dimly lit room, and you are not allowed to use flash. But for the equivalent of $1, they will briefly turn on a light so that you can photograph the hand. In the dim light, we couldn't even see the hand in the case.

St. Istvan (Stephen)'s Cathedral

Inside of St. Istvan's Cathedral

Stained Glass Window in St. Istvan's Cathedral

Sign pointing to the room holding the mummified hand of St. Istvan
A picture of the hand can be seen on the sign

The second largest synagogue in the world is in Budapest. The largest is supposedly in the U.S. We walked around the grounds and were able to sneak a peak inside. It looked quite fancy with gold and stained glass windows, which is quite unusual for a synagogue.

Budapest Synagogue

Inside the Synagogue

In the evening, we took a dinner cruise down the Danube. We were able to see the castle, Fisherman's Bastion, Parliament, and some other buildings we hadn't see on our tour of the city. A Hungarian dinner would not be complete without goulash soup. The desserts were particularly tastey, and there was wonderful live string music during the cruise.

Phil and Julie aboard the Danube cruise ship

Julie & Phil sitting on the deck of the ship

Budapest is known for its hand-embroidered and crocheted items, porcelain, and paprika. The stores also sold dolls dressed in Hungarian clothes and painted eggs.

Handmade items in the store fronts

Our local guide in Warsaw, Poland kept referring to the 4 great mustaches (pronounced moustaches) of Poland. So we couldn't help but take notice of what we called the #1 mustache of Hungary.

#1 Mustache of Hungary

The exchange rate was $1 = 200 Florins. It was kind of fun walking around with such large bills.

Hungarian Money