The Trip to Eastern Europe – Budapest Tour

Neil and I learned that the magnificent city of Budapest, often called the “Queen of the Danube,” was at one time two cities, separated by the Danube River.  Buda lies on the west hilly side of the river, and Pest is on the east, which is the flatter side of the river. In 1873 the two were unified into one city. Most of the older classically elegant Baroque-style buildings are in Buda, and Pest is the more modern looking side of the city.

We’ve had the good fortune of spending time in many capitol cities in Europe, and all of them are lovely in their own ways, but it would be difficult to find another city as beautiful as Budapest. I hope you enjoy this “tour” of photos we took on our second day there.

The highlight of our walking tour was the elegant Matthias Church, still in use for Roman Catholic services today. A church was first built on this site in 1015 AD, by St. Stephen, King of Hungary. It was rebuilt more or less in its present form in the 14th Century and restored in the 19th Century, and again after German and Soviet forces used it as a camp was restored in 1950-1970, with work continuing to this day. Matthias Church is a survivor of conquering forces including the Turks, the Nazi’s and the Allies, and finally a Communist government. It stands in the heart of Buda’s Castle District.

Note the beautiful ceramic tiles on the roof. They need to be replaced every hundred or so years due to weathering.

The interior walls are still being repainted by Budapest art students who attend an art institute nearby.

Because of the outside light coming in, you can’t see the designs on these exquisite stained glass windows, but during the world wars, these windows were removed and hidden in caves under the city to preserve them until they could be reinstalled decades later.

I hope the reflection in these modern windows is able to help you see the difference between the Baroque buildings of the past as compared to what we are building today!

At the end of our tour, we had free time to go shopping. These are Hungarian florints. One US dollar is worth about 213 florints.

Yes, Budapest even has McDonalds! But at the end of our city tour, we chose to explore a pedestrian area and opted for Hungarian goulash at a sidewalk cafe.

Our walking time in the city included taking in the beauty of the nighttime city-scape. One of our favorite views was of the Chain Bridge, built by the same man who designed the London Bridge. This Bridge is also a walking bridge, so our tour of the city included walking across it from Buda back to our hotel in Pest.

Tomorrow, I’ll explain a little of the language research that I did for my novel BONE FIRE while we were in Hungary. Hope you’ll join me!

Happy Traveling!

Sue