Budapest, Day 2

On Saturday, we visited the Grand Market, by walking the opposite direction down Vaci Utca (Fashion Street) to the end. This direction was quite different in flavor, with souvenir and antique shops.

The market is a huge building with three levels. In the basement is a grocery store, but the ground floor is covered with stalls. Merchants proffer meats and sausages, fruits and veggies, beans and legumes, pastries and sweets, and, of course, paprika. Entire booths filled are filled with paprika, sweet and hot, in gift packs, tins and bags, with tiny wooden scoops. Tourists throng to buy their souvenirs.

On the top level, we waded shoulder to shoulder through the prepared food stalls, watching people buying a beer to help their shopping (at 10:30 am!) or langos -- fried bread with toppings, either savory or sweet, many looking like small pizzas.

Then we perused the souvenir wares. Ceramics, woven blue with white painting or white with multicolor floral decals. Brightly embroidered linens and traditional folkwear vests. Wooden toys; brightly colored cut crystal; T-shirts. We saw a rhinestone version that said only Buda, but never found the more masculine version for Poppy.

I found some hand-painted blown eggs that were different from the traditional motifs, and succumbed to a bright coral egg with a chickadee set in a scalloped oval. 850 HUF (Hugarian forint) or less than five dollars.

Leather was very common as well, purses and gloves and fur-lined caps, not quite the thing to take home for summer in Austin. The cutwork felt bags were too tempting to pass up though.

When we emerged after our shopping trek, cherries and chocolate cookies in hand, the streets were wet. Back to the hotel we went to plan our trip to Trofea Grill, an all-you-can-eat-and-drink Hungarian buffet. Off we went again, to our first trip on the Budapest metro, in the oldest line built before 1900. The old trains were noisy and wobbly. Most interesting was trying to buy the tickets from a machine with no information in English. Hungarian is NOT related, and those 14 vowels and 30 consonants don't make any sense to us.

We managed to make it to the restaurant, and sat down to our table in an old, traditional upstairs room with beamed ceilings, informed that we had two and one-half hours to consume all we could of the 100+ dishes. Keenan immediately tried out the seltzer water bottle and sprayed us all. The waiters brought us glasses of champagne and were a bit mystified by Joren only asking for still water. They tried to talk him into a soft drink, to no avail. When I refused a second glass of champagne, the response was "Really!?"

The food was fun to explore. I most enjoyed the salad bar, since salad seems quite expensive here in restaurants. There was a large selection of conventional salad veggies, plus another large display of prepared salads and one of fruits (Joren finally got the banana he has been seeking since getting leg cramps). We didn't even make room to try the various sausages, the tray of liverwurst, or other appetizer items.

We were entertained by the automatic chafing dishes that opened when you stood in front of them, to retrieve goulash, sliced beef in gravy, chicken with peas and mushrooms and roast potatoes, etc. Best was the roast duck legs. I've even enjoyed the sauerkraut here, which doesn't have the strong vinegar flavor it seems to have at home.

Other than those two outings, we had a light day because we just needed a break.

Budapest, Day 1

After two weeks of travel, all in our party are tired. On our first morning in Budapest, we weren't chomping to hit the trail as early as usual. Keenan ventured out for pastries to bring back to the room, while Joren and I luxuriated our sore tootsies in the deep tubs.

Then we undid all the soaking by hoofing it down the river promenade toward the Szechenyi Chain Bridge. Legend has it that Count Szechenyi had the bridge built in the mid-1800s after storms prevented his crossing of the Danube River to be with his dying father (he even missed the funeral).

On the far side of the bridge, the funicular took us up to the top of Castle Hill, where the Royal Palace/Buda Castle and Matthias Church stand. Royal residences here date to the 1200s, but have been repeatedly destroyed and rebuilt. The view from the funicular was the best view of Chain Bridge.

In the back of the palace complex, excavations of the ruins are underway, and the hills surrounding Buda are apparent in the background.

Nowadays, the castle houses three different museums, but we found ourselves not so interested in the Hungarian National Gallery, Budapest History Museum or even the Contemporary Art Museum (showing Croatian sculpture). I feared we are museumed out.

We did enjoy the views back across the river toward Pest, flat as a pancake in contrast to Buda.

Prince Eugene of Savoy, who built the Belvedere Palace in Vienna, stands overlooking the river.

Nearby, the mythical turul bird from Hungarian myths guards the palace

Friday was hot, in the mid-80s, so we kept seeking shade. Somehow heat in Europe is harder to tolerate, probably because of the dearth of air-conditioning. The combination of breeze and water cooling made this fountain a popular place to hang out.

After wandering for awhile in the Castle District, including finding an apothecary (pharmacy) for sunscreen, we settled at Sisi's Etterem (yes, the same Sisi we learned about in Vienna) for lunch. We all finally caved to the pressure of pizza, and each ordered a different variety to share. I went Italian with ham and mushrooms. Joren tried Hungarian, with Kielbasa, onions and paprika. Keenan was obviously craving Mexican food, so his pizza was decorated with chilies and beans.

Later we walked on through the winding streets, peeking into souvenir shops, until we found a tourist information booth. There we collected a better map and booked tickets to see a Hungarian folklore dancing performance on Sunday evening. Eventually we made it down to Matthias Church, where we declined to pay for admission.

We did pay to go up on the ramparts at the nearby Fishermen's Bastion, with its fairytale turrets. The view from there included the Matthias Church, the statue of Stephan I of Hungary, and the Hungarian Parliament Building, second in size within Europe only to the English Parliament building.

Eventually we returned to the funicular for the ride downhill, then crossed back over the Chain Bridge and moseyed again down Vaci Utca to our hotel.

A few hours of rest found us ready to try a different sidewalk cafe for dinner, but unwilling to walk too far. Joren had been craving pasta, so we stopped at Cucina, an Italian restaurant just around the corner. There he proceeded to skip the pasta and order duck with pears and potatoes. Keenan had chicken with gorgonzola sauce. I tried the chicken special, stuffed with zucchini and cheese, wrapped in thin ham, and sauced with saffron. Yum! One of the best meals of our trip. Of course, we left room for ice cream after another stroll.

Vienna to Budapest

On Thursday we boarded the Rail Jet from Vienna to Budapest, rolling at speeds up to 160 kilometers per hour across rolling hills lined with crops and wind mills.

Our taxi driver spoke just enough English to establish that our hotel is on the flat, Pest side of the Danube River. The opposite, hilly shore is Buda.

Our hotel this time is an Executive Apartment, with two bedrooms. Joren is thrilled to have a king size bed of his own, and I'm thrilled to not have to share a bathroom with a teen. Our bedroom looks out over the Ersebet (Elizabeth) Bridge.

In the early evening, we went out walking along Vaci Utca, Fashion Street, which is half a block from our hotel. This is a long pedestrian shopping district, lined with street cafes and coffee houses. Eventually we settled in at one corner for dinner, watching the thick throng of passersby. After dinner, Hungarian specialties like Chicken Praprikash, we wandered around a bit more to find pastry shops to try for breakfast munchies. Then we went back to the hotel for the exciting task of laundry.

Vienna, Day 5

For our final day in Vienna, we escaped to the countryside. We decided to take a day trip to the Wachau Valley, including a leg on a boat on the Danube River. First we made our way to Westbahnhof (the West train station), where we purchased a combi ticket with rail, boat and culture tickets all included. Then we boarded a train to St. Pollen, west of Vienna. There we changed to a one car train headed to Melk.

The main attraction in Melk is Melk Abbey, found by following the signs “Sticht Melk” ever upward.

The Abbey is a beautiful yellow and white complex overlooking the river on a bluff.

We exchanged our vouchers for tickets, then went for a tour of the gardens while waiting the meeting time for the English tour.

The pavilion building was a lovely pastel pink stucco, with weathered gray wood shutters and a plethora of roses in full bloom in all colors of the pink spectrum. The other gardens were mostly a tended forest with paths and occasional flower gardens.

The tour took us through a history of the abbey, founded in the 1100s by the Benedictine order from Italy. Waiting in the stairwell, we learned that the pink and yellow colorings were typical of Baroque era buildings, echoing an obsession with pink marble and gold.

We saw the Imperial wing, where the Empress Teresia stayed when she visited from Vienna. The hallway, 600 ft long, is further enhanced by varying the height of the ceiling along the corridor to make it look even longer.

The dining room similarly used faux painting to emulate the look of marble (only the doorway surrounds are actually stone) and to elevate the ceiling, which is actually flat and only extends 6 feet above the molding.

The church is in the center of the compound, viewed from the rampart that looks out over the town and river.

Most impressive was the library, with shelf after shelf of gorgeous leather and gold bound books in Latin, Greek and Hebrew. The four cardinal virtues stand in the corners, marking the different areas of study. Many more rooms have newer volumes in modern languages.

As we exited the tour, we saw the fabulous baroque church interior, but couldn’t really look around as noon services were beginning. The abbey is still a working abbey, with 30 monks in residence and a school for local children.

Afterward, we wandered through the picturesque old town of Melk, stopping for lunch next to the central fountain. Joren enjoyed his pizza, complete with hard-boiled egg slices and large peppers. Keenan and I tried the Cordon Bleu, our substitute for schnitzel.

We popped into a few shops, collecting a few pieces of pottery, then wandered down hill toward the boat docks to board the Prinz Eugen.

We sat on the top deck, where I got a crimson sunburned V on my chest, watching as castles and vineyards floated slowly past. One hill was said to produce 57,000 liters of wine.

About an hour down river, we disembarked at Dornstein, billed as the prettiest town in the Wachau valley.

We climbed the steep passages up to the winding main street with picturesque shop signs.

After we walked the full length to the scenic overlook, we returned more slowly, stopping in the occasional shop looking for treasures (read chocolate). This area is renowned for apricots, so everywhere we saw apricot liquors, candies, jams and juices. We stopped for apricot spritzers (soda water with a shot of apricot nectar) and sweets. Joren and I had chocolate sundaes while Keenan tried the apple strudel.

Eventually, we walked out of the old part of town to the Bahnhof, only to learn from the closed building and posted signs that the train only runs on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Fearing that we might be stuck in Dornstein, we decided to double time it back to the boat dock, where there was one more pickup that afternoon. After getting there and checking the schedule, we realized that the time we remembered for pickup was actually the last departure time from Melk, so we just sat and waited for the boat rather than climb back up to town for less than an hour. When the time for the boat’s arrival came and went, we really started to contemplate the hotel back at the top of the hill. Fortunately, the boat was just running late, 20 minutes behind schedule, and we were able to make our way to Krems.

In Krems, we had more than a mile walk to the train station, through a thoroughly citified area. Luckily, we arrived five minutes before the train to Vienna departed. We made it back to the hotel by 9:00, tired and footsore, to grab a piece of cheese with a roll from the lounge and fall into bed.