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| enjoying the fall leaves in Slovakia |
Although we spent a good amount of time in Vienna, the temptation to make a couple day trips was too much to resist. So one day we hopped on a 2.5 hour train to Budapest, and the next day we went to a Viennese cafe in the morning and visited Slovakia in the afternoon.
Budapest
Our trip was a bit less planned than usual, so we read up on both stops the day before and then mostly wandered around. Getting off the train at the Keleti Station in Budapest was very much like what I expected from a post-Communist eastern European country--pretty bleak, with lots of concrete and moldering buildings and abandoned construction projects. We also discovered that Budapest isn't big on promoting tourism at the train station, so we pretty much had to pick a street and hope we were walking the right way.
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| the statues are important people in Hungary's history, including fierce-looking Magyar chieftains (right picture) |
We walked about 3km before we finally saw something I recognized, the
Heroes' Square (aka, Hősök tere). We congratulated ourselves on not completely walking in the wrong direction, then found an invaluable walking tours map in the art museum by the memorial. Next stop:
the famous Széchenyi Medicinal Bath (the largest in Europe!) and then Vajdahunyad Castle (yeah, we don't know how to say it either) in the City Park.
The baths are one of the many things I would like to try if we ever go back to Budapest. Unlike in Germany, it looks like most of the bathers wear swimsuits, which is a requirement if I'm going to be sharing any sort of water body with strangers. Next time! The castle was quite eclectic and housed the National Agricultural Museum that, according to TripAdvisor reviews, is actually pretty interesting. That's another thing for the 'next time list!'.
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| Vajdahunyad Castle |
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| home of the national ag museum, in the castle grounds |
We then walked even further and finally made it to the old part of town. Keleti train station is on the Pest side, which is much flatter with wide, tree-lined avenues. We heard about several interesting-sounding museums in Pest (the Terror Museum and the Hospital in the Rock), but we decided to see more of the city instead. We finally crossed the famous chain bridge, over the Danube, and into Buda.
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| looking across the Danube at the Buda side of the city |
We climbed up to Buda Castle, which shares a hilltop with government buildings, museums, and other beautiful sights. After grabbing a
chimney cake, we realized that we were right by the National Library. Hungary is a possible case in J's dissertation, so while he braved the unintelligible Magyar language and intimidating library, I wandered around a bit more and enjoyed the views.
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| I loved this fountain :) |
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| St. Matthias church, with it's intricately tiled roof |
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| looking across the Danube from the Fisherman's Bastion |
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| the famous parliament building |
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| the Hungarian National Library |
We were surprised at how much we enjoyed our visit to Budapest, having heard mixed experiences from other visitors. It's a city that I wouldn't mind coming back to--there are still so many things that we would have liked to do!
Bratislava
We went to Bratislava on a bit of a lark, as it's only an hour away from Vienna and it's another pin to put on our map. Bratislava, unlike Budapest, felt like the type of place you could see easily in a day, so we were quite happy with the 5 hours we had to wander around.
Our first stop was the castle (aka
, Bratislavský hrad) on the hill. The castle itself was not spectacular, but it had wonderful views of the old town as well as the very stark concrete buildings across the river. The contrasts between graceful buildings in the old town to the east and the communist-era buildings on the other side of the Danube to the south were really interesting!
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| (left) looking south across the Danube (right) and east into the old town |
The old town of Bratislava is partially enclosed by a wall on one side, and it's filled with winding streets and slightly decayed (but still lovely) old buildings. The fall leaves were at their peak and the afternoon light was especially beautiful, so walking around the city was a pleasure!
We really enjoyed both of our semi-spontaneous day trips from Vienna. Some day we'd love to go back and finish our tour of Budapest!
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