Budapest Day 2

I’ve been telling anyone that would listen to me drone on about my plans for this trip how excited I was to go to the Wine and Cheese Festival in Vajdahunyadi Castle in Budapest - how amazing does a day of tasting Hungarian wine and cheeses sound? In a freaking castle?! Excited for the day ahead, and with some directions from one of the staff at the bed and breakfast, I started walking towards the castle, which I was assured was only about a 20 minute walk. While the time estimate was just about spot on, when I checked my phone for precise directions about 15 minutes into my walk through town, I realized that there must have been a translation error and they had sent me towards Buda Castle (which, to their credit is the much larger and much more famous castle in Budapest). Still feeling out the public transport system, I decided to walk the majority of the way to take in the sights, which was about an hour walk in the opposite direction. The detour did allow me to take in the view of the Parliament building from across the Danube, I’m note sure I ever tire of looking at this building.

Was lucky enough to have some sun today to capture this shot

Whelp, when I arrived on the grounds I couldn’t help but notice the castle was a bit quiet for a festival to be taking place. Turns out, according to the big events calendar poster that I found, the festival had happened 4 days prior on the 24th, not on the 28th like the always trustworthy internet had told me. My day of gluttony so rudely yanked out from underneath me, I set out to explore the ‘castle’ and the surrounding City Park.

The castle is really not a castle, but a monument to 1000 years of Hungary built in 1896. It is an interesting chimera of 3 different Hungarian architectural styles which was originally constructed out of wood and cardboard, but then built into its current, permanent form due to its popularity with the Hungarian public at the time. Outside the castle, there is a monument to “Anonymous” who is the first chronicler (or historian) to write about Hungary, although no one knows who he actually is. The statue is really quite cool, although one person did point out to me on Instagram that it looks a bit unsettlingly like Voldemort.

Given that I had planned to spend most of the day getting wine drunk and stuffing my face with cheese, I had some extra time to kill, so I decided to head back to Buda Castle as I had become fairly familiar with how to get there during my earlier walkabout. (This time I mostly used public transport however.) Buda Castle sits atop a hill on the opposite side of the river from where I am staying, and is visible from just about everywhere in the city. As such, there is a funicular (tram that goes up a steep hill) that you can take up to the castle which was pretty neat, and in the castle there is an art museum which I spent some time appreciating, although I only took a picture of the skeleton king looking sculpture I posted below because I thought it was really cool. Turns out there’s a whole bunch else to do at the castle that I missed - but luckily I was able to come back at a later date - more on that in a later post. As I was leaving Buda Castle, the sun was setting (it sets about 4PM here) and I captured some of my favorite shots so far of the sunset over the river, and the Parliament building at night (literally in love with the parliament building). After about 14miles of walking according to the Apple Watch, I called it a day with some Goulash Soup and a long shower.