We hadn't made it to the Danube on day 1, so we started towards it in the morning and figured we'd find and follow the crowd. It didn't take long to find the Danube...the crowd, a little longer. By the way, the weather was terrific for the 1st two days. Low-80's, very little humidity, a nice breeze. So, Meliss would walk in the sun and I would stay in the shade and all parties were very pleased.
The Danube is crossed by 8 bridges in total and 4 that are in the heart of downtown that connect Buda and Pest (we were staying on the hilly Buda side). There are really 3 main bridges we got to know and they were the green bridge, the white bridge, and the green bridge w/ lions. Just so you know, those are not the official names -- if you walked around calling them that people would laugh at you.
People will also laugh at you if you ask them where the festival is if you start your day 3 bridges (about 472 miles) away. This happens to us a lot -- ask Meliss about our trip to Vegas when it took us an hour to make our way out of our hotel to the get to the strip. Idiots is not just a name!
We walked along the Buda side of the Danube taking pictures and looking for landmarks we recognized from our extensive research. We took a lot of pictures.
From Bridge #1 (Petofi Bridge looking towards the heart of Budapest).
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| view from Petofi - you can see liberty (green) and Elizabeth (white) bridges in the distance |
From here, we walked along the Danube towards the second bridge AKA the green bridge AKA The Liberty Bridge. Along the way we saw this -- but still have no idea what it is. We just thought it was neat and kinda creepy.
It was soon after this that we realized we could not feasibly take pictures of all the neat statues, monuments, busts, engravings, etc (in Hungarian that's "sabati, sabati"). However, we still tried to get the really outstanding ones.
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Szabadsag Vamhaz-- AKA 1st green bridge
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| us on the green bridge (pre-hill climbing) |
Anyway, on we went. We figured it was a few kilometers between bridges which converts to about 12 miles. As we go to the Liberty Bridge, there was a huge hill w/ a castle/fortress type thingie built into the side of it and a big statue of a cross leading up to a bigger statue of what looked to be a lady holding a serving platter of some type.
Not knowing any better, we began our ascent. And up we went, a nice pleasant stroll at first -- this turned into a real hike about 1/4 way through. Some nice picture spots though...
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| notice the castle/fortress thingie, the cross, the lady with the serving platter, and THE HILL! |
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| view from the cross |
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| we made it this far! |
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| and we still have this far to go... |
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| my happiness is in indirect proportion to the size of the hills i have to climb. |
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| Wally World's closed? |
And then... we find this sign about 3/4 of the way
up.
Un-effing-believable. Sorry moms. Seriously, could they not have put this sign at the bottom of the hill? Who is climbing this hill that wouldn't want to go the the serving tray lady? Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!
We were not the only pissy people at this spot -- and all of us cursing under our heavy breathing in different languages too!
We did not return (on foot --but that's a whole other fiasco), but this damn serving tray lady torments us still! At some point this year we are going back to Budapest and going to see her up close!
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But, we're taking the bus.
In any event, we now got to walk down the hill which spit us out at the white bridge AKA the Elizabeth Bridge.
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| On our way down the hill |
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| white bridge AKA Erzsebet |
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| damn barbarians! |
It turns out that the hill is Gellert Hill and the Citadel. The fortress in the side of the hill was built in 1854 by the Hapsburgs after defeating the Hungarian Revolution of 1848-49 (still a touchy subject).
St. Somebody or other is actually St. Gellert for which the hill is named. He really was pushed down the hill by barbarians.
Finally, the serving tray lady is the Hungarian Liberty Statue -- erected in 1947 in remembrance of the Soviet liberation of Hungary from Nazi forces (maybe should have thought that one through a bit longer, but whatever.) Why she's holding a serving tray I don't know...maybe that's why the guy in the cafeteria got so mad at me.
At this point, we crossed the bridge and also found the crowd -- we were close to dehydrated after our hike so we filled our water bottles at this water fountain. We saw other people doing it and figured it'd be safe enough. We both took a big gulp and had Meliss set her watch cause we'd know in about 15 minutes if that was good idea or not.
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| we weren't gonna drink the water from this fountain... but then figured - what's the worst that can happen DYSENTERY!!!! |
Got hungry by this point and were looking for Langos (like a fried flat bread w/ assorted toppings...yes, pizza) but couldn't find it -- we did find and Amerikai hot dog stand though! I am not going to try to describe this in detail -- suffice it to say it would never be confused with an American hot dog...maybe in Chicago?
At any rate, we ate it -- we got it w/ mustard, but not rice. Yes, that was an option. We were so hungry -- we forgot to take a pic. By the way, if you ever wondered what an non-American hot dog might look like...don't.
Next post -- rest of the evening and fireworks on the Danube.
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