Remembering the past - 12 September 2008

The second largest Jewish Synagogue in world is in central Budapest and, built in a Moorish style, is quite a magnificent building. The stainless steel weeping willow tree in the grounds is a holocaust memorial with each leaf inscribed with the name of a victim.

From there it is a short walk to the Grand Market down by Elisabeth bridge where we feasted our eyes only before making our way back to our very centrally located lodgings.

When the communists were finally overthrown, some far-sighted city father decided that the numerous monuments dotted around Budapest glorifying the Stalinist era and the glorious workers' state should not simply be scrapped so a representative collection of them was assembled in Memento Park. This lies southwest of the centre just outside the city limits so is a bit of a hassle to access. There are tourist tours that go once per day for 3950 HUF but if you make your own way there it costs 2440 HUF.

The park includes a Trabant and some authentic footage from films used to train 'agents' to spy and inform on their fellow citizens including how to secrete your Super-8 camera in your handbag and how to best position it to carry out your covert surveillance.

The Danube Bend - 11 September 2008

The 'official' Danube tourist boat trips have optional excursions to look at the sights on the Danube Bend; our cheapie homespun Danube trip had us whistle straight past these spots at 65 kph so we had to make our own arrangements to get back to these towns.

We began the day with a trip in a modern spacious comfortable air-conditioned train from Budapest to Esztergom where there is a Basilica that is far too big and grand for the smallish town where it sits on the hilltop overlooking an S-bend in the Danube. The painting over the altar is supposedly the largest painting on a single canvas and is a copy of Titian's Assumption.

For a small fee, one can climb the 413 steps to the walkway around the cupola for an absolutely stunning view of the Danube and the surrounding area. Having walked around the outside of the cupola, we were about to descend when the attendant at the top beckoned us to follow through a fenced-off area. He took us halfway round the cupola, demonstrating the amazing echoes on the way. At the halfway point, he indicated that we should stay while he returned to the other side. He then treated us to our own private demonstration of the amazing acoustics in the space between the internal dome of the Basilica and the external roof of the cupola. Apart from worrying that this delay might mean that we would miss the hourly bus to our next stop, it was rather a special treat.

We raced back down the hill and realised that we did not have time to make it back to the bus station. We saw a bus with the correct name on its destination board and asked the driver. He indicated that we were to wait on the other side of the street for the bus that would take us to Visegrad, so we duly did.

The bus came and drove straight past the bus stop. Seeing our consternation, a friendly local indicated that the correct bus stop was a further 100m up the road so we raced after the bus. Fortunately the traffic lights were against the bus and in our favour and there was a horde of people waiting so we had no bother catching the old rickety totally overcrowded hot and steamy bus.


Eventually the crowd on the bus thinned and we could get a seat as we followed the Danube round to Visegrad. We left the bus there and slogged up the 350m climb to the fortress on the hill overlooking another S-bend. The views from the top did compensate, although the payment to visit the castle is not really worth it. However, no payment, no view.

After slithering down the more direct path to the road via St Stephen's Tower we waited for the next bus to arrive. Neither the path from the town or the path from St Stephen's Tower qualify for any better status than 'rough tramping tracks requiring sturdy boots'; we had our sandals and although both paths had been streams very recently following overnight rain, we made the round trip without incident.

Our last stop was the totally delightful town of Szentendre. Its pedestrianised centre is very twee and after exploring thoroughly we enjoyed a truly memorable meal at the Elisabeth restaurant in the square. Night had fallen as we made our way to the station at the end of the suburban HEV train line for our ride back to Budapest, leaving us a short stroll along the Danube to enjoy the city by night.

Budapest - 10 September 2008

We wandered across the chain-link bridge and rode the funicular to the top of the Palace hill. The area around the palace was off-limits unless you wanted to buy a ticket to the wine festival that began later in the morning. We decided to explore the rest of the Castle Hill area; now a UNESCO World Heritage site, and it was great to wander along streets lined with beautiful buildings. We particularly enjoyed the Fisherman's Bastion, a medieval looking viewing platform, which was actually only built in 1905.

Dropping back down to the river, we crossed the bridge again to visit Gerbeaud, the famous cake shop that has been a must-visit destination almost since it opened in 1858.

Back across the bridge we wandered up the "Buda" side of the Danube to the next bridge which allows access to Margaret Island which we explored before crossing back to the "Pest" bank as far as the Parliament buildings. Just downstream from there is the place where, during WWII, Jews were executed on the bank of the Danube, but before they were shot, they had to take their shoes off; shoes being a valuable commodity at the time. To remember the atrocities, there are a number of bronze shoes on the riverbank, a poignant reminder that their owners have gone, never to return.

The Blue Danube - 9 September 2008

Having checked out of our very nice apartment in Bratislava we made our way to the "port" to wait for the hydrofoil to Budapest. In due course the Vocsok III from Vienna arrived and we joined it for the rest of the trip to Budapest. If yesterday's trip seemed fast, it was nothing compared to the hydrofoil. They only seem to exist now in ex-communist countries and this one cruised at between 65 and 69kph all the way, apart from the time in the only lock on the river. This lock is probably the largest we have been in so far and certainly the greatest level change, approximately 25m.

The Danube was certainly blue and the first touches of autumn were beginning to colour the trees on the banks as we raced downstream. There was not a lot to note as we travelled, the odd town or two, until we got to the famed "Danube Bend", a place were the Danube makes a fairly decided change from flowing east to flowing south. The two notable towns on the bend are Esztergom and Visegrad.

From there it is a relatively short run into the centre of Budapest where we disembarked and set off to find the tourist office that had handled our booking and then the accommodation itself.

We had booked a room in a private apartment and were greeted by a lovely old couple who spoke as much English as we spoke Hungarian - none. They were a delight to stay with though, as were treated to home baking and fruit from what we suppose was their allotment. Her strudel, with their own apples, was better than any we purchased.

Although the accommodation was ‘homely’ with some fairly odd-plumbing, the location was superb; we were about 100m from the only station that services all three Metro lines, a short walk to the square, the river and all the central sites and amenities.

Bratislava - 8 September 2008

The 0900 sailing of the Twin City liner was cancelled so we were rebooked on the 1230 trip which gave us a very lazy start to the morning and a few hours less in the capital of Slovakia. Nevertheless we really enjoyed browsing around this very attractive old city; it appeared spacious, relaxed and not overly touristy as we wandered around the old town and climbed the hill to the castle.

The river trip was anything but relaxed, from the moment the catamaran turned around after leaving the dock, it was "pedal to the metal" with the twin Kiwi Hamilton Jets pushing the boat up to cruising speed of 60 kph even though we were still in the side part of the Danube that flows through Vienna.

The only interest along the way were a couple of settlements where the river crossed the border between Austria and Slovakia, Hainburg on the southern bank and Devin on the northern, both with ruined fortifications on the skyline.


The Bratislava castle terrace overlooking the river affords view to Austria in the southwest and Hungary in the south as well as across the faceless blocks of apartments in the modern part of the city across the river.

If you are passing this way and want to sample the local cuisine then we recommend the Slovak Pub for good value food.

Waltzing around Vienna - 7 September 2008

Although we set off to walk the 4 km ring road that surrounds central Vienna we made so many side trips and diversions that our final route was more like a drunken figure 8 than a ring.

Starting at the upstream end where the ring starts by the river we wandered past the Stock Exchange and the University until we got back to the museum quarter. Then we headed back through the Hofburg to find the Judenplatz and Rachel Whiteread's Holocaust memorial erected in 2000. The Austrians took nearly 50 years to admit their complicity in Hitler's atrocities and thus this memorial is one of the first in Austria. The inside-out library is both simple and striking.

From there we went to the downstream end of the ring and wandered back around to the museum quarter where we visited the Kunsthistorisches Museum to look at the largest collection of Brugel's in the world and one of only two sets of 16th C tapestry cartoons in the world; the other is in the V&A in London and, by way of complete contrast, one of 5 Canadian $1,000.000 coins made in 2007 from 100kg of 99.999% pure gold.

Vienna - 6 Sepember 2008

15C and rain in London? 30C and sun in Vienna? It was a tough choice but having woken to glorious sun in Vienna this morning, we decided to stay and explore the city.

Our hotel was just across the river from the centre of Vienna so we made our way to Stephansplatz to have a look at St Stephan's Cathedral with its attractive patterned roof. Along the Graben we checked out another local tourist attraction, the underground loos designed by Aldof Loos and the beautiful baroque Peterskirche with its wonderful frescoes. An unusual extra in this church are two glass-fronted shrines enclosing the bones of two martyrs brought from the catacombs of Rome in 1730, The bones are clothed in the style of the period with cut-outs in places so that the bones can be seen. All quite macabre really.

There was obviously lots about to happen in the gardens in the Hofburg as people we setting up for a country-comes-to-the-city festival of some sort but we wandered on through the museum quarter and down to the Naschmarkt that, unlike the festival area, was in full flow with thongs of people jostling past the stalls. Exiting the far end we checked the map and found we still had about 7 km to go to the Shloss Schonbrunn, that earlier information had indicated was only 20 minutes away - clearly not on foot.

Time for the U-bahn and, fortunately, the station we were near was on the direct line to Shloss Schonbrunn. When the palace was built it was far enough away from Vienna to be the summer palace, now it is a short ride on the U-bahn.

After carefully considering which ticket combination to purchase we settled on the Classic Pass which afforded us the extended palace tour, entrance to the Privy Garden, the Gloriette at the top of the hill, the Maze and the Apple strudel show. The strudel show was well worth it; watching the chef spin a smallish lump of dough out to an area that wasn't much short of a square metre and so thin you could read through it, was quite amazing.

The palace and formal gardens are quite stunning and wandering though the rows of trees, all meticulously manicured into vertical walls where they fronted a path, allowed us to stumble across all manner of extra delights that did not seem to be mentioned in the information we had been given.

Maire Antoinette was a famous daughter from this palace, Napolean's son was "confined to barracks" here for his short life to keep him out of the political arena, Mozart played here for the Empress when he was 6 and Kruschev and Kennedy first met here for a Summit in 1961, so it has seen a fair chunk of history.

On our way back to the hotel we enjoyed the tail-end of the afternoon with a cold drink and a sun-lounger on a "beach" of golden sand on the banks of the river.