Visiting Budapest: Day 2

Yes, I disappeared into the land of wallpapered rooms, but I'm back and I PROMISE to get this euro trip written down by the end 2012....or April of 2013.

Day 2 in Budapest was a little bit more relaxing, in part because we got to go to the baths! After waking up, doing some wandering and shopping in the market, we strolled on down to the Széchenyi thermal bath, it was built in 1909 and is one of the oldest  baths in Europe.  Located in City Park it took us a while to find the main entrance. We purchased a 3 hour pass, rented some towels and got into our bathing suits.  The elegant architecture of the building, the beautiful tiles and the steam from the baths and saunas made Széchenyi feel like this beautiful maze I was happy to be exploring. Around every corner was a pool of a different shape, depth or temperature. We spent our time exploring the interior of the structure, until JM discovered the saunas. I'm not a huge fan of saunas so I just soaked on my own.

After we were done exploring the interior, we spent the rest of our time in the outdoor baths. The weather was perfect (58 degrees) for the warm water and we enjoyed swimming and watching Hungarians play chess on floating boards.

Once our three hours were up we dried off, showered, and changed. We wandered through City Park until we eventually found a metro stop (FYI Budapest Metro is the 3rd oldest mass transit system in the world) to take us back to Great Market Hall, where purchased meats, cheeses and breads for our over night train to Prague, and where I indulged in a delicious Langos (re: fried dough covered with bananas and nutella)

 Andrassy Ut

Entry way to City Park

Széchenyi Baths - can you spy jon?

On the metro

I ate the whole thing myself

Guide-wise

- Rick Steve's guide to Eastern Europe. yes.

- The NYT (are you sensing a trend).

Sleeps

- Starlight Hotel Budapest - I loved this hotel, again it was huge and we had great views of the city

Things to do, eat, see

- Do walk through Buda, Pest, along the Andrassy Ut to City Park - go to a Bath, 

- Eat a langos, and do yourself a favor and drink a glass of Hungarian wine while you sit along the Danube. I did, at a recommendation from my favorite lady abroad. 

- See City Park, Great Market Hall, Chain Bridge

 

Up next....Prague - the city where I finally ate butter and declared it cheese!