23. Budapest, Hungary Part 1

I arrived in Budapest at 2am, wrecked after a delayed flight from Dublin — a full 16 hours after I'd left home, door to door, on public transport.

 

The Accommodation

My HomeExchange host David had sent excellent, detailed instructions for getting to his apartment in the city centre. It was still a 1.5km walk from the night bus stop, so I called a Bolt — the Eastern European answer to Uber, and often cheaper.

David's apartment was at the back of an internal courtyard on the third floor. In its heyday it would have been a very grand home, with very high corniced ceilings and tiled floor. 

It was his childhood home, and as he now lives in Spain, he has joined the HomeExchange community to make use of his Budapest bolthole when not in the city. It was stuffed with books, CDs, childhood memories and three tvs! As it had no shower, I had my first bath in a decade (I prefer showers!) with the seemingly limitless supply of hot water on tap. 

In the morning, after a nice strong coffee, I  activated my BudapestGo three-day travel pass and headed into the city. I used the very clean and modern metro and was there in 5 minutes. 

 

First Impressions of the City

Budapest, as many readers will know, has two sides to the city, separated by the wide river Danube, one called Buda and the other called Pest. They were entirely separate cities until they merged in 1873. Buda is on a hill  and is quiet and affluent. It is known for its green, residential streets and regal, historical atmosphere. It contains the castle and Fisherman's Bastion. Pest is flatter and is where most of the commercial and cultural city centre is. Its skyline is dominated by St. Stephen's Basilica. 

My first impression of Pest was nothing like the Budapest I remembered from 27 years ago. The building façades had all been cleaned, showing them off properly, and the streets - which I remembered as choked with traffic, were now pedestrianised, lined with café after café spilling out onto the pavement. 

 

 

Brunch

I did some research on brunch places, as it was already 11am, and found Cafe Brunch (top marks for originality!) which caught my eye as it was getting 5 stars on Google and 4.5 on TripAdvisor. 

I ordered Hungarian scrambled eggs: red onion, peppers, spicy paprika sausage, all cooked in plenty of butter, served with a side salad and two kinds of bread roll. The peppers and the paprika were the tell-tale signs that I was in Budapest! Delicious, filling — and, at 5,700 HUF (€14.50), way overpriced. Lesson learned: check the exchange rate before ordering, and steer clear of the obvious tourist spots. I should have crossed the square to the cheaper place instead — I only photographed it for my daughter Anna.

In the next post I continue to explore Budapest with a walking tour. 

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