Budapest

Budapest is a lovely city, split in half by the Danube River with Buda on one side and Pest on the other. The buildings are grandiose. It seemed somehow more spacious than Prague. Partly maybe because there were less tourists. But the river is wide and the streets wider too and the buildings bigger and…well, grandiose.

We got to Budapest a little later than anticipated. Our bus had a little mishap. When we stopped for a bathroom break someone noticed that there was green liquid pouring out of the bus. A mechanic was called who had to drive away to get a part and then come back to fix it. We hung around at the highway gas station for 2 hours before we were on our way. We all took it in stride. A group of people had a number of bottles of alcohol that flowed freely on the bus before it broke down, and continued flowing in the ditch beside the broken down bus. I hung out in the shade under the gas station awning. I had some good conversation with others. We commented on how the bus break-down helped us get to know more people.

After we finally arrived in Budapest, checked in to the hotel and had our very overdue lunch, a group of us went on a nice walk. There’s a big castle compound up at the top of the hill in Buda. We walked up there and around and watched a big thunder cloud roll in, threatening to pour. A little restaurant/wine cellar was in the right place at the right time. What a great little find. There was a lovely little string trio playing Hungarian gypsy-style music even “La Vie en Rose” sounded Hungarian. We had a few bottles of wine and Glen mostly called out requests…Dvorak, Bartok, Liszt and the band played on.

Larry and I skipped the three hour bus tour of Budapest the next morning. Instead we walked. We crossed the Danube over the big chain-link bridge and walked around the pedestrian zone on the Pest side. We just walked and took in what we could see and experience and feel without having to pile on and off of a touring bus. We may not have seen as many things, or heard as much history but we preferred our choice. Lunch at an outdoor café was nice and then I had an afternoon nap before concert time.

I’m still trying to get back to feeling my regular self. The exhaustion of June, the boiling heat of the weather and back pains haven’t allowed me to be in top energetic form. As of today, the weather has cooled down, I seem to be getting enough sleep again, and the Ibuprofen I bought yesterday seems to be helping my back. So hopefully I’ll feel better in this next section of the trip.

Now Budapest, from my very limited experience, is not as advanced in the whole renovation stage as Prague and Brno are. And there seemed to be more buildings of Socialist architecture as part of the infrastructure. And I don’t think that they should necessarily all be torn down. They are a part of history too and tell a story and serve as a reminder of a certain time. Peter pointed out that he thought the beautifully, perfectly renovated city centres we’d seen reminded him more of an amusement park. And he preferred the rougher, aged state of this city. I do see his point.

The concert in Budapest went fine. I think we perhaps sounded a little more tired. We were are the front of the church so the audience could see us this time. I seemed to have a scratchy thing in my throat, which made me feel like my voice wasn’t as great as it should be. And I came in on a wrong entry with a couple of other people. He made this grand gesture that to me looked like he was cueing us in. Oh well. At least I didn’t get kicked out of the Inner Sanctum. ☺

Lovely dinner at a Hungarian restaurant of Goulash and Spätzle afterwards.