prague, last april

Prague was beautiful, but Krakow stole my heart. We arrived early in Prague on a very rainy and cold day. We couldn't check into our hostel till two, so we spent the morning walking and visiting the Museum of Medieval Art. Throughout our two days there, we explored the entire city, visiting Prague e Castle, St. Vitus Cathedral and the Lennon Wall. We drank many Czech beers, made friends with an elderly Czech man and a Japanese tourist in a dive bar, ate butter that looked like cheese and had an amazing time.  I will admit to feeling a bit tired while we were in Prague, so I didn't take the best notes of where to go and eat, but when I get that together, I'll certainly post it!

City Center

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!

Budapest! - day 1

Hi All,

I promise I'm still here! Just busy with lots of exciting house things, and as soon as I find my missing camera cord, I will show you all! I want to keep on with my posts about our exciting European travels of 2011 before the year is out.  So lets do this!

We spent our last day in Poland visiting Auschwitz. Incredibly informative and sad. I was shaken to the core learning more about the horror of this period in European history, in part because my grandfather, who was Polish, and his family members, were sent to German war camps and concentration camps - the reality of what they (and others went through) really hit me. But I'll write more on that later.

After spending the day at Auschwitz, we returned Krakow and meandered around the city center until it was time to board our overnight train to Budapest. That is right, I said it - overnight train. At first I was excited, but then I was nervous that Jon would fall out of the top bunk on to me (and yes we tried to snuggle in one bunk, but it was cramped and just not worth it). I ended up not sleeping, and woke up very grouchy. We arrived in Budapest a little late, and since we were only spending 36 hours in the city we immediately stopped for coffee and snacks to gear up for a full two days.

Budapest is the largest city in east central Europe, and is historically two cities. Buda on the west bank of the Danube, and Pest on the east. It is a big, modern city. After our amazing time in Krakow, and my sleepless night on the train, I was a little overwhelmed by the hustle and bustle.

I have to say, on our first day in Budapest, we covered a lot of territory.  And this is because  J and I are into some serious walking when we travel. We spend lots of time meandering - and this works great for us. I like experiencing and seeing the nooks and crannies of the city, and he reads to me from (what else) Rick Steves Guide to Eastern Europe. We stop when we are tired, take pictures when we feel like it and usually end up  enjoying lots of delicious treats and beer.

Our first day in the city walked through the large market in Pest and across the river to Buda and around the castle.  The two sides of the river are incredibly different. Pest is bustling, busy and modern (imagine traditional 18th and 19th century architecture mixed in with those communist block style buildings), whereas Buda is quaint and quiet (think cobblestone streets, secret courtyards, and narrow cafes). We stayed in Pest, but I think if we were to visit again, I'd probably want to stay in Buda  - sure Pest is where the action is, but I felt like I could have wandered around Buda for hours!

Danube from the Train

Pest

More Pest

Paprika is a big thing in Hungary

me and my yugo

Buda

Castle ruins

krakow, poland - 5 months later

For those of you who have been following for a while, you know that this past April, the husband and I packed our bags and took a whirlwind European adventure.  We began our adventure on April 6th,  and despite a bumpy start to the trip (between RVA and Newark), I was able to recoup with some vino and actually enjoy our uneventful flight to Frankfurt (well, uneventful except for a slight medical emergency. The flight attendant actually got on the loudspeaker and asked if their was a doctor of the plane! Luckily there was and the patient was, thankfully, only suffering from panic on a crowded plane). We landed on time and barely had time to yawn in Frankfurt before we were off on our Luftansa (SO NICE) flight to Krakow.

Let me just start this by saying that I, with all my heart, absolutely LOVE Krakow.  It is such beautiful city, with fantastic history, and great eats--plus it was quite affordable compared to the other European cities we visited.  Also, it has that whole iron curtain, cold war vibe going on, making it super edgy with communist era architecture. Visiting Krakow was also a homecoming of sorts for me, as my grandfather was born and lived in Poland till he was in his 20's when he,  my grandmother, and mom moved to the US. My grandmother is Italian and though I've visited Italy twice, I never felt home, the way I did in Poland.

We arrived early, and checked into the phenomenal Hotel Royal. Our room was giant! 

The hotel was right along the Planty, a garden/park that loops around the whole medieval and historic city center. We arrived the day before Easter, and since Poland is predominantly Catholic, families were out bringing their easter baskets to churches for blessings. Because everything was open, our first day spent wandering around historic Krakow, visiting churches, the market square, tasting food, and drinking tons of coffee (due to the fact that we had been awake for 24 hours at this point).

spring shadows in planty park

spring wreaths

kawa

cobblestones

cobblestones and fryes

Post coffee, or kawa, we headed up to Wawel Hill. Wawel Hill is a castle or fortress, of sorts, situated along the Vistula river - it has quite a history and is made up of a number of beautiful architectural styles.  It is also home to one of seven of the words chakra stones.  There is a particular wall were visitors can touch to feel the chakras. You'll see a photo of me touching the chakra wall below.

Husband = the Best Guide

Chakras! (I blinked!)

Polish easter baskets!

Beer, or pivo, with a straw! I'm actually drinking beer with rasberry syrup!

Day two of Krakow was Easter Sunday.  We woke up and had a delicious brunch and then headed to Kazimierez, an incredibly beautiful neighborhood filled with beautiful synagogs and rich in Jewish history. 

As we were climbing Krak hill, it began to snow. I have to admit, I should have packed warmer for this trip. I had my rain jacket to protect me from the wind and wet, but few other layers -- I remember wishing I had packed tights to wear under my jeans!  We kept walking to keep ourselves warm, and eventually made it to the Museum of Modern Art - Krakow and Schindler's Factory.

Krak hill is that mound in the back ground

SNOW!

View from Krak hill

Visiting the Museum of Modern Art- Krakow and Schindlers Factory.

 Eventually we made our way back to the Historic Center and got lunch at a bar mleczny, which translates literally to mean "milk kitchen." It is a polish staple, harkening back to the wwII and  communist era - essentially bar mlecznys were created to provide workers with quick, cheap, nourishing food. Quite delicious, and a great way to try out different polish foods.  We shared a plate so that post lunch, we could sample foods  from the market square. 

I spy perogis

No idea what this was called, but it was cheese inside fried dough, with strawberry preserves. I ate five.

After wandering and shopping some more, we got dinner at our hotel and headed to bed. If you are heading to eastern europe anytime soon, I'd highly recommend visiting Krakow. It is such a fun city to explore by foot and stomach. While most of this post is pictures, see below for a few recommendations we have for traveling to one of our new favorite cities.


Guide-wise

- Rick Steve's guide to Eastern Europe. Throughout the trip we kept saying "WWRSD?" (what would Rick Steve's do?) whenever we hit a snag. Most of the time his suggestions guided us to a positive outcome.

- The NYT did a great 36 hours in Krakow

Sleeps

- Hotel Royal

Eats

- Restauracja Pod Baranem - Probably my favorite meal of the entire trip. Traditional polish fare. Get their beet soup. Do it.

- Kwandras Lunch Bar - bar mleczny

- Miod Malina - traditional polish fare with an italian and eastern europe modern twist. Best hungarian chicken soup of my life, and delicious spinach perogies, we ate here just before we got on the overnight train to Budapest (more on that later;)).

Things to do, eat, see

- Do walk along the Vistula river (plenty of paths and safe for walkers and bikers), wander across the river and visit Kazimierz, climb Krak hill, take a day to visit Auschwitz (we weren't so sure at first, but I'm glad we did - it was incredibly sad, but also informational).

- Eat perogies, (drink) pivo with syrup, beet soup.

- See Planty park, old town square, and Wawel Hill.