Four Day Itinerary to Budapest
My long-term aim with this account is to make it into a travel blog. When I finish university next year my aim is to be more concise with the writing I post on here and to target a specific audience. My intentions after graduating are to spend my money travelling the world and hopefully each place that I visit I can share it with everyone and write about what I did there. I originally thought I would give attempt some travel blogging posts by sharing my holidays I was going on this summer. Seen as I don't think that is going to happen, I am going to write a travel summary on my holiday to Budapest which I went on in June 2019.
Day 1
On my first day in Budapest it was relatively late when we arrived, so we caught the bus into the centre and checked into the easyhotel Budapest Oktogon. It is so easy to get from Budapest airport into the centre as a local bus service departs every 30 minutes from outside the airport, bus 100E. The hotel we stayed in was relatively central approx. 15 minutes' walk from most restaurants and bars and about 30 minutes from the tourist spots. I travelled to Budapest with my friend Katie and since we were both students, we were not looking to spend lots of money on a hotel so found this easyhotel for a really good price with plenty of facilities and modern décor.
https://www.easyhotel.com/hotels/hungary/budapest/budapest-oktogon.
Day 2
Our first morning waking up in this city and we were so excited to see everything. We visited on an incredibly hot week so had to remember to bring sun cream. In spite of the hot weather, there was a nice breeze in the air, so we weren't too hot walking around all day. We started our morning by getting breakfast in a local café we found called Budapest Baristas coffee shop where we sat outside whilst deciding what to do on our first day.
We first decided to find Citadella waterfall, but on our way we got lost and ended up walking up Gellert hill. A great nature walk, but not fun in the scorching heat we were in. We eventually found the waterfall and had to take a photo in front of it after the amount of effort we had gone to too find it.
Budapest is split into two sides by the river Danube. One side is Buda and the other is Pest. Since we were already in Buda, we decided to do the sites closest to where we already were and ventured next to Buda castle. The castle is accessed via a mountain cable cart or by a hilly nature walk. Again, being students, we decided to walk, and it only took us about 15 minutes, less time than it would of taken queuing for the cable cart. The best bit about the castle was the sights from the top as you could see for miles including a great view of the Budapest parliament building which looks like a palace.
The castle was home to the Hungarian Kings of Budapest and built in 1265 so contains a lot of history and is built with the most fabulous array of stone and brick. It was here at the castle that we stopped and bought and ice cream from the café as it was getting really hot and we needed to stop for a while. Budapest is a cheap city for food and drink, yet the café was one of the more expensive places with it being the only place to get refreshments at the castle.
My favourite place we visited on this day was Fisherman's Bastion, an ancient fortress which my photos don't give justice to how beautiful this place really is. There are lots of different lookout terraces that give panoramic views of the city. It was built in the late 1800's to celebrate the 1000th birthday of the Hungarian state and the bastion inspired the architectural design. A great thing about the sites we saw on this day was that it was all free entry and if you are prepared to walk you will only need a bottle of water to get you through the day. When we finished in Fisherman's Bastion, we took a stroll along the river and crossed one of the bridges to head back to our hotel. It was only when we crossed the river, we realised how far we had walked and had nearly an hour walk back. There were lots of trams and buses around for anyone who perhaps can't walk that far but we slowly headed back taking in the hustle and bustle of the Hungarian Capital and looking for ideas on where we could eat later that evening.
When we were ready and dressed for the night, we were wondering down alley ways and streets similar to where we walked back earlier, about 15 minutes from our hotel. We found a large amount of people emerging from a particular street. We decided to take a look and found Gozsdu Udvar food court, a wide alleyway lined with a variety of restaurants. It was outdoors but there was also inside seating available. The ceiling of this food court was lines with plants and fairy lights and there was something for everybody in this place.
Unfortunately, because we went last year, I can't remember the exact names of the restaurants we ate at and got snacks and drinks at over our trip but I know in future to write them down for blogging purposes.
Day 3
After a lovely breakfast in Gozsdu Udvar we headed for the other side of the city, Pest. The one thing we had booked prior to visiting Budapest was the Széchenyi thermal baths, even though these baths were 45 minutes away from where we had breakfast we decided to walk there stopping at different attractions on our way.
The first place we stopped at was a rather intriguing looking place called the Museum of Sweets and Selfies. Although it was not a very cultural stop, it was fun and different all the same. It cost less than 10 Euros to enter and we spent about 25 minutes inside.
After we finished in this museum we carried on to Hero's square. We decided with the weather being so warm we wanted some outdoor space to cool off and sit for a while. Someone I follow on Instagram had been to Budapest about a month before and had ridden a pedalo boat near to Hero's Square so we thought it would be fun to do the same. The pedalo was super cheap to hire and we had nearly an hour on the lake. The temperature at this time was so hot we had to go and find some shade after we finished. We sat on the grass under a tree in the park with some water we bought from a corner shop, people watching at the many people in the park.
We carried on our walk from here to the thermal baths. This is one of the major tourist attractions of Budapest. The baths are supplied by two thermal springs at 74 and 77 degrees Celsius. I enjoyed the baths, sitting in them was really relaxing and felt strange to be in such hot temperatures outdoors. One thing I would say about these baths is that the indoor areas are quite dirty, and the baths are very busy. I think they are a good thing to go and see if you are in Budapest, but I don't think these were the highlight of my trip at all. Plus, if you are going here make sure you remember flip flops and a towel because you will not want to walk around bare foot.
We had a slow stroll back because, like the previous day, we were over an hour walk away from our hotel. That evening we ate in the food court alleyway again. We said it would have been nice to eat along the river, but the prices were more expensive there than in the more rural parts of the city. After our evening meal we went on a mini bar crawl to go and see the famous ruin bars of Budapest. These bars are built in the Jewish quarter of Budapest in the ruins of abandoned buildings. From the outside these bars look like normal houses, but when you step inside the bars are lit up by fairy lights, graffiti covers the doors and the bar looks put together from scrap materials. The atmosphere is friendly and pleasingly chaotic and a great way to meet new people. The price of drinks in here in still really cheap despite these bars being a major tourist point.
Day 4
On our final day our flight wasn't until the evening, so we had nearly a whole day to explore. The hotel we stayed at kindly let us leave our bags for no extra charge. I had seen a famous cathedral which looked like something worth visiting but it wasn't at the top of our priority list. On the final day we decided to go to the cathedral called St Stephens Basilica. There is a small entrance fee and then a number of steps to climb to get to the top. When reaching the summit, you can walk around the top of the building and see a great range of Budapest. Every hour, the clock of the building chimes and you can listen to the soft bell sound. We had a small lunch in one of the local café's in the Basilica area and decided if we found this place sooner it would be a great place for an evening meal.
Considering this wasn't high on the priority list, this was one of the best things we did, and I would highly recommend.
After the visit to the basilica we had a stroll along the river and came across the shoes on Danube bank. These shoes and boots were made as a memorial to honour the Jews who died in Budapest during World War II. This memorial was a subtle way to pay respect to the people killed.
After looking in gift shops and a few stores we made our way back to the hotel and headed for the bus stop, sad to be leaving Budapest after the amazing few days we had had.
I would recommend Budapest to anyone. A great place to travel with a significant other or a group of friends. I would say if you visited Budapest as a solo traveler to be careful around the city at night because it can be quite frightening. As far as spending money goes, don't listen to people who say take euros because it is a lot cheaper if you take all Forint, the Hungarian currency. Everything in Budapest is such a great price and extremely reasonable so don't worry about spending money because like us, you will probably have lots left over.
I hope this has helped anyone thinking about Budapest, what to do and where to eat. I would love to write more holiday reviews and itinerary's because I've really enjoyed writing this!