Thermal Baths and Ruin Bars

Of all the places Travers and I have been, I would have to say the most surprising was Budapest. Once two different cities, Buda and Pest, the city is surprisingly young and modern with a mix of old architecture and lots of history. And while I won't get into the history too much, I was surprised to learn that Budapest was very recently a communist city and only within the last 20-30 years has become a Democracy.

So the day after I got back from Florence, Travers and I hopped on a plane to Budapest. I was in great need of a relaxing vacation after a hectic work trip in Florence.  We arrived with little problems at the wonderful Kempinski Corvinus Hotel. And after studying a map for a bit, we headed out to stroll the streets and see what we could see.  We walked out of the hotel, down a touristy street called Fashion Street, and out towards the water to see the Danube River.  After circling a bit, we found a touristy restaurant to have a late lunch, while we planned the next few days of our trip. Travers tried a traditional hungarian goulash and I had a tasty pea soup! The first of many delicious meals.

We wandered some more that afternoon, checking out all the interesting architecture. While some buildings looked old and historic, others looked modern and strangely new. We also walked to the Great (Dohány Street) Synagogue, which is the 2nd largest in the world! After a few hours of walking, we decided to head back to the hotel to rest up before dinner time.














After researching a few good restaurants, we headed out to find them and have a tasty dinner. We walked past St. Stephen's Basilica and past lots of tasty touristy looking restaurants. But we headed towards the water to have a pre-dinner drink at a restaurant on a boat called Spoon. This boat is one of a few that has wonderful views of the Buda side of Budapest and allows guests to gaze at the buildings lit up on the opposite side. We got there just as the sun set and were able to see all the lights come on in the city.  After the drink, we strolled some more and eventually found a tasty restaurant for dinner.

The next day we took the metro to Heroes' Square, where we saw the Millennium Monument, which has statues of the leaders of the seven tribes that founded Hungary in the 9th century. We then walked to the nearby City Park where we went into the Szechenyi Thermal Baths. We rented a cabin (the tiniest changing room ever) and put on our swim suits and joined the hundreds of other people hopping from one pool to the next.  These photos don't even do it justice, because there was an entire inside pool area where there were several different pools of all different temperatures. You go from one to the other and some people would sit in the really hot pool or hot sauna, then jump into a freezing cold bath really quickly. It was fun to see Travers run from the hot sauna into the freezing water.










After several hours of pool time and feeling quite relaxed from the baths, we headed towards Vajdahunyad Castle, where we picked up tickets to see a hungarian music concert later that night.  We then headed back towards the hotel and passed by a random statue of George Washington! We later read that it wasn't so random, but you can click on the link here and read more about it yourself :-)









That evening, we found another delicious restaurant for dinner and got a great window seat so we could people watch. We had HUGE portions of food (apparently thats how they do it in budapest), drank some tasty creative cocktails, then headed to the hungarian music concert!









The concert ended up actually being more of a musical, and it was all in Hungarian so we couldn't quite understand what was going on (I think it was a love triangle but I couldn't quite tell). But the singers were really good. The costumes were fun and colorful and beautiful. And the entire show was just a good time. Here are a few good pics I took while there.

Our third day we decided to take a free walking tour that was recommended to us by our friends Dave and Angie Visser. They said it was a great tour and you get to see a lot of the highlights in 2-1/2 hours and its free!  So we met the group in one of the main squares and took the tour for the next few hours. We walked past a few things we had already seen, but were able to hear about the history of Budapest. We walked across the Chain bridge to the Buda side and climbed the stairs that led up Castle Hill to take in the views of the Pest side below us.  We saw the Hungarian Parliment Building, and the Buda Castle, and learned a lot about the history of Budapest.









We ended the tour at the Matthias Church and the Fisherman's Bastion, which gave us even more views of the Pest side of the city.











After taking it all in, we headed back down the hill and found a much needed restaurant for lunch called Carne di Hall. The food was delicious as usual and we split a bottle of Rosé, watching the boats go by in the Danube.  After lunch we took a long walk (longer than we anticipated) to the Nyugati Train Station, known for its glass wall structure and the most beautiful McDonald's ever. Now I wasn't a believer that a McDonald's could actually be beautiful, but the inside of this McDonald's actually was very beautiful. The ceilings were gorgeous, the decor was warm and friendly, and it just felt like the last kind of architecture you would see for a McD's.









We continued our walk past the Hungarian State Opera House, and into a part of Budapest that was known for its ruins, and particularly the ruins that were basically old hollowed out buildings that people had turned into outdoor bars and restaurants.









After our long walk we rested in our hotel and decided to head back out to the ruin bars to experience them at night with a lot of other local hungarians. We went to a couple different places, each having its own character.  The first one we went to served tacos that rivaled those at Tacolicious (a taco restaurant on Chestnut St in SF). And the other we went to was more swanky (as swanky as an old ruin can be), with some chairs and couches for lounging in some areas, and lots of white decor and cool lighting. After a few drinks and checking out several places, we grabbed a burrito to go and headed back to the hotel.

Our final day in Budapest was spent relaxing some more at another thermal bath called Rudas. This is an indoor only bath house that is more relaxed and mellow than the pool party scene we experienced at the Szechenyi Baths. The inside had a dome above the main pool that had various colored glass skylights and when the sun came through the dome, it shone all these colored rays down into the pool.  This bath also had the hot sauna and hot pool that people would go into, but instead of jumping into an ice cold pool, they had a shower with a bucket above you that was filled with ice cold water, and you go in and pull a rope and the bucket tips over dumping the cold water onto you! It was freezing, but so much fun to do after the hot pool!

The rest of the day, we walked to the Cave Church, but due to a wedding weren't able to go inside, and to the Great Market Hall, a large open air farmer's market. We got burgers for lunch, and then went into St. Stephen's Basilica just as a wedding had finished up. We got to see the bride and groom get into their getaway car out front while a photographer shot picture after picture.

Later that night we had ourselves a wine picnic in the park across the street from our hotel. Then found an outdoor bar that was showing some of the Olympic games. Hungary is really good at men's water polo, so we were able to watch one of those games, and we joined hundreds of others as we watched one of the men's swimming races. It was amazing to hear people from all different countries routing for their team! And even greater to have Michael Phelps win the race :-)


















After some pizza and beer, we headed back to the ruin bar area to check out a couple others that we hadn't seen the night before. The first one was a rooftop bar at the top of an old department store. We saw great views of the city below, lit up at night. And the second was another ruin bar that had funky decor like bikes hanging oddly from the ceilings, a large screen to watch the Olympic games, and a woman singing old american jazz songs.









I would have never thought Budapest would have all the amazing things it has. And so much history as well.  I think we saw as much as we could see. Spent enough time relaxing in the thermal baths. And were able to party with the locals at the ruin bars and eat some delicious meals!  We left the next morning happy to be going back home to Geneva, but I would definitely go back to Budapest again as it has so much culture and interesting things to do and see.