Month: May 2026

On our second day in Budapest we really took advantage of our transit pass to see a large swath of the city. The day began with us taking the #23 tram in front of the campground to the parliament building. I was pleased that the tram ran all of the way to the parliament in fact for most of the trip it ran parallel to the river.

At one point a tour got onto the tram and we learned that the #23 tram was once voted one of the most beautiful tram rides in the world. We jumped off at the massive parliament building and began our day.

The building is one of the landmarks of Budapest and is the largest parliament building in the world. The interior is as beautiful but all of the tours for the building were sold out for the period we are here so we will have to settle for the slide show we watched in the visitors center.

We walked along the river and it is one of the most beautiful river fronts I have seen. As I said yesterday I am completely impressed with how all of the major buildings in the city seem to present their best side to the Danube. It not only makes for a beautiful skyline but allows you to appreciate the buildings from multiple angles as you walk along both banks of the river.

Further along the river we came to a beautiful but sobering tribute to the Jewish population of Budapest. Prior to WWII Budapest had a thriving Jewish population of over 400,000 people. Hungary was allied with Germany until 1944 and as an ally was able to protect the population. The Germans occupied Hungary in early 1944 fearing the Hungarians were negotiating to leave the war. After the Germans swept in they began the biggest shipment of people to concentration camps since 1942 decimating the Jews in Hungary.

Today there is a tribute on the banks of the river called the Shoes On the Danube Bank. In December of 1944 20,000 Jews were taken to the banks of the Danube and executed by Hungarian Fascists, they were forced to take off their shoes before being shot so that their bodies would tumble into the river, the shoes were considered too valuable to allow to be swept away . The bronze shoes lining the Danube are a tribute to the people lost in the holocaust.

Our next stop was heroes square. It is a large square away from the center of the city dedicated to historical heroes of Hungary. There were a lot of big statues of people you have to be Hungarian or a very well read European historian to know.

We had a lunch of goulash today that was ok but not quite what I expected. If this is good goulash, (the restaurant was very full) it appears to be a variation of beef stew and while it was fine, it was not substantially different than an American beef stew. I think I will give it one more chance before finalizing my verdict.

Ton wanted to visit the central market as she remembered it as one of the most impressive in Europe. I punched central market into google and we jumped off the tram in front of a nice building that looked like a market, but Ton looked confused. When we went inside the old market at this site had been converted into a modern supermarket. It turns out there are two buildings called central market, one on the Buda side where we were, and the famous one on the Pest side.

I punched the other central market in and we had to endure another beautiful tram ride along the Danube to a steel bridge. We chose to walk across the bridge so that we could interact with the river some more.

We arrived at the market and this one was much larger and still functioning as a market (even though there was an Aldi supermarket hidden in the basement.) Ton enjoyed looking around even though it was bursting at the seems with people.

She had a few things in mind and was particularly interested in paprika. After spending 30 minutes wandering around amongst the crowds we headed into the basement to the Aldi to get some essentials for François.

Our tram 23 had a stop at the market, so after getting our essentials taken care of we headed back to François for the evening.

Ton really wanted me to see Budapest. She visited about 20 years ago and it made a big impression on her, and when we talked about this trip she always referred to it as the Budapest trip. So I was looking forward to see the city that made such a big impression on her.

We have been in Europe for their labor day (May 1 in Europe) and have had it influence our trips. On our very first trip we were in Paris on labor day and were going to head to the center when the desk clerk warned us we should stay in Montmartre for the day because- as he put it they would be having the annual May Day riot in the center. We spent part of our day watching live coverage of the riot on TV. As we walked around Montmartre you would have never known there was a riot going on 20 minutes away. In Poland we learned that the whole country shut down for not only labor day but the whole week as they had scheduled 2 other national holidays in the first week of May. We ended up in Kraków for 6 days as the campground owner there allowed us to stay out of pity, every campground in the country was fully booked for that week. So we were wondering what we were in for today.

The streets were quiet and the tram was pretty empty so we were optimistic when we arrived downtown. We decided to head to the Basilica as that is where we usually start our city visits. For the first 5 minutes we were on side roads and Ton said that the crowds weren’t too bad. 30 seconds later we turned onto the avenue that St. Stephens faces and we found the crowds. In addition to the normal load of tourists, there were a lot of labor day tourists from the surrounding countries, we heard a lot of Slavic languages being spoken in addition to the normal German and English you hear in every city. The campground is an indicator that this is a labor day destination for Hungary’s neighbors as we are surrounded by plates from Slovakia, Poland, Romania, and Slovenia instead of the normal French, Dutch, English and German RV’s

St. Stephens is a beautiful cathedral, but today it was teeming with people and tours. Ton spent a lot of time wriggling her way around groups of people to get a photo without a head in it. I spent my time on the edge of the crowds trying to enjoy the beauty while keeping an eye on Ton so I didn’t lose her.

After St. Stephens we decided to cross the Danube on the Szechny Bridge. Once again the views were beautiful but it was a challenge to enjoy them without getting swept along with the crowds. But as I looked at the city from the bridge I began to realize how all of the major buildings in the city seemed to be drawn to the river. Many great cities have a river that shapes them but Budapest is striking because so many of the important buildings in the city compete to show their best face to the Danube.

After the bridge we tackled the climb to Buda castle. About 80% of the way up the hill we saw a cafe and decided that we deserved a beer. In the cafe we shared our table with a Brazilian couple who we enjoyed speaking to.

At Buda castle Ton really wanted to visit the fisherman’s bastion as it had really made an impression on her last visit. When she visited she remembered standing on the walls of the bastion listening to a Gypsy Band playing Hungarian music. She was so impressed with the band that she bought one of their CD’s. Now you have to pay to walk on the walls of the bastion and their were not any local musicians around. But the views are still incredible.

Ton than consulted her list of places and said that she wanted to visit the area of ruined pubs. I punched it into google maps and to my surprise it provided directions to the area of ruined bars. So after a bit of a walk to a tram and a transfer to a bus we found ourselves in an ally on the edge of the old town. The ally had character and it did have a bunch of pubs though I would not call them ruined, but intentionally funky.

We had to wait 15 minutes for our pub of choice to open, but by the time it did we had been joined by another 40 or 50 people. I’m not quite sure how to describe the pub. It is consciously outlandish and unabashedly aimed at tourists, but it is so over the top that it works and is almost charming.

We found a table and Ton immediately took off to take pictures. She came back and told me that we didn’t need to rush to get a table as the place was immense. As we were drinking our beers a steady flow of tourists wandered thru our room including at one point a guided tour.

We settled into the routine and enjoyed taking in the steady flow of people including one Canadian couple festooned with Canadian flags on their clothes and backpacks. We guessed they wanted to make sure they were not mistaken for Americans.

As we were chatting the couple next to us leaned over and asked where I was from? They were American and had been trying to figure out my accent. It turns out they were missionaries who live in Austria helping to resettle refugees. They were on a weekend retreat away from their three teenagers and seemed to be having a great time.

We walked to the New York cafe which bills itself as the most beautiful coffee house in the world, to see if we could be tempted to overpay for coffee and a desert. Any thought ended when we saw the line of people waiting to get in. So we decided to head back to François for a much more affordable dinner.