Budapest

This past weekend, the 22nd till the 24th, I was in the beautiful capitol of Hungary!!!! Budapest, the capital, is about 7 hours away with the bus and train. On Friday I went to Linz (2hours), where most of the exchange students met up and we took a bus to Budapest. The other exchange students met up in Vienna and we saw them all in Budapest. Not only was this a very pretty city but I also got to see my friends who are doing an exchange in Hungary.  I met them back in October during Vienna Weekend and now the Austrians went to them!!! We arrived around 5, and then after dinner, around 7:30 we did a quick tour around the block.

The long bus ride.....

I tried to play Battleship, but forgot the "I"..oops

Hero Square

A castle, it was originally built out of wood and cardboard as a temporary place, but then was later rebuilt out of stone. The moat and water around the castle comes from natural spring water.

Its soo pretty

Wow, I might move to Budapest just for this view.

playing Rotary games and then curfew/bedtime of 11;30

On Saturday we had a bus tour of the city. It was amazing to see how pretty the city was and I was also very impressed with our tour guides English. I know that I would not be able to speak that good of Hungarian.

Back in Hero Square, this is a statue the first king who transformed Hungary into being Christian, he was very loved by all his people and also helped Hungary become part of the more modern Europe at the time. The coronation crown still exists and every king after him had to be coroneted with this crown, unfortunately we were are not allowed to take photos of the crown. It is over a 1,000 years old!!!

This is a statue of Matias the Just. He became King at the age of 14, and almost all his advisors tried to take his land away, but as he got older he managed to get everything back. He is dressed in skins and almost like a commoner because he would dress up as one and go into the cities, and learn what it was like for his people as one. Hence the name, Matias the Just.

After Hero's Square we went to the other side of the city and went up on top of the hill where they have their own version of the Statue of Liberty.

looking out over the city with Lilacs. It was very warm, around 26 degrees Celsius.

Almost at the top!!!

At the top, its sooo flat

cotton candy

the city just keeps going

almost Statue of Liberty, Budapest-ified.

At the top with friends.

amazing church

it almost could be from Cinderella

photo bombed

Nikkole got to hold a falcon, the national bird, even with her broken arm!!

Hanging out in the shade

speechless

looking out into the city

Parliament

Inside

Exchange Students in Parliament

After the parliament tour, we came out to a peaceful protest. They had several hundreds of thousands of bikers bike through the city. They were protesting the lack of bike paths in Budapest, so they got a lot of people and went through the streets.

Shoes on the Danube, there are 60 pairs of iron shoes lined up along the river. They represent the victims of the Holocaust and WW II, who were shot into the river. They had to remove all clothing and shoes.

looking out into the city

taco/burrito things with pig knuckle, it was surprisingly good

Gulasch on top on hash browns...my new favorite food.

a market, it was very similar to the Christmas Markets in Austria in December

On Saturday night we watched Les Miserables, play form, in Hungarian.

Sunday we got back on the bus and headed home. I was up early and went through the city before we left to get another couple of photos.

a 3km long street, built similarly to the one in Paris

Good bye Budapest!!!!!

Thank you. Next week starts Europe Tour!!! Meaning lots more photos.