Wow, our first real trip in nearly six months! We need to get out more…

Over the weekend we took a 4-day trip to Budapest, Hungary (which inevitably resulted in lots of jokes from Josh whenever I said we should get something to eat). Historically, this city is two in one: quieter old-town Buda on the west side of the Danube, and busier, hipper Pest on the east. We stayed at a lovely B&B in Buda, one stone staircase downhill from Buda Castle and 700-year-old Matthias Church; our bedroom windows looked east across the Danube to the spindly, red-roofed national Parliament building. We wanted this to be a relaxing trip, so we took our time with a couple of self-guided walking tours, visits to the Opera House, Hungarian National Museum, and House of Terror (housed in the former communist secret police headquarters); and to St Stephen’s Basilica (home to the actual right hand of St Stephen, first king of Hungary), the Jewish Cemetery and Holocaust Memorial Park at the Dohány Street Synagogue, and the vast Central Market Hall. We spent a couple hours each day having coffee/tea and cake in traditional cafes, and savored national dishes including chicken paprikás, gulyás (goulash) soup, Lángos, chocolate mousse-like Rigó Jancsi cake, and poppyseed-stuffed crepes. YUM.

Sunday was the day-long Bartók marathon at the Palace of the Arts concert hall; when we stopped by to get tickets for a performance of the Miraculous Mandarin, we got lucky and also snagged fantastic seats for a later performance of Bluebeard’s Castle, with the world-renowned Budapest Festival Orchestra. Neither of us are huge opera fans, but the orchestral music was incredible.

We ended our trip on Monday with a morning-long soak at the Széchenyi baths, the largest medicinal bath in Europe. The indoor baths, quite green due to their mineral concentration, were great for a calm soak, but our favorite was the outdoor (yep, even in February!) thermal “amusement” pool with whirlpools and massaging water jets…the perfect way to end a holiday!