Buda-Buda-Budapest

So many might not know that I almost studied abroad in Budapest. UNH engineering had a managed program that went to Budapest, but of course the semester I wanted to go, they shut down the program. So, I was so excited to get a chance to see what I missed out and oh boy was it a trip of a life time. 

Day 1

For the first time this semester, we left Wednesday night. This was the first time not having to wake up at 3 am in the morning and sleep walk my way to the airport. Everyone one was in good spirits and full of energy. This trip was planned through a program called WSA (weekend student adventures). They had the whole weekend planned out for us and with suggested things to do, but the program and our hostel wasn't booked until Thursday. So, we had a bit of a dilemma to sleep in the airport or pay for a room in the hostel. My friend, Aliya, had messaged the hostel we were going to stay at if there was any way we could stay there, but not pay for a room. They said it was totally fine and we could sleep in the common room. We show up at the hostel and they say it is fine and show us where we can sleep. About 2 hours later, a girl turns on the lights and tells us we cannot sleep here and quote "its not cool guys". We tried to explain our situation to her, but she was pretty wasted. Eventually we got it all sorted out, but 2 hours later, all the drunkies got home. And boy did we get a show. We were trying to pretend to sleep, so they didn't bother us, but that didn't work out. I open to my eyes to a guy hovering over us and says, "anyone want to cuddle" and jumps on top of us. I was dying with laughter. Then 10 minutes later his friend jumps on top of us and tries to have a conversation with us about why we were sleeping there, but again they were extremely drunk. They kept running around saying "we don't work here" (next day we learned that they did work at the hostel). The whole things was a great thing to laugh about in the morning and a good insight on what our trip was going to be like. 

Day 2

With very little sleep, we woke up around 9 am. That is when we got to meet everyone in the hostel and the workers and the guests all seem to be very good friends. We talked to some of the guests and they said they had been there for a couple weeks. We couldn't check in until 2, so we decided to go explore the city a bit. We got a map and started exploring. We looked at where WSA was going to show us and tried to go other places. What we did learn was that the city actually is split into Buda and Pest. On the east side of the river was the Pest side which is very flat and where all the craziness happens. Then there is the west side of the river which is Buda and is much more hilly. We headed to the Buda side to see the Castle and the Citadel. We heard at these places, you get a good view of the city plus we weren't going to go to the Citadel with WSA. It was a decent walk to get to the Castle from were our hostel was. But, when we got to the water we got to see all the different bridges on the water. As a civil engineer, we love looking and discussing bridges. They were all so beautiful. As we walked up to the Castle which was on top of hill, you got a great view of the Chain Bridge with the Basilica in the background that stands taller than anything else around it. 

Chain Bridge

 At the Castle, we just walked around and there was also a great view of the Parliament Building (which I would later get to see up close on the booze cruise which I will get to later).

Parliament Building

 And of course, we stopped to take some picture.

Me and Aliya

Then was the fantastic task of trying to get over to the Citadel from the Castle. The map we got was pretty crappy  and all the streets were confusing to read. We walked down to the main street and then made our way up a hill which we thought it was on. We maneuvered through many different residential areas. Had my heart skip a beat when out of no where a dog was barking about a foot away for me. Eventually we saw signs of tour buses and we followed the direction they were going. As we were walking up, you get a great view of the Castle we had just come from.

The Castle

 When we got to the top of the Citadel, there were some great views, but of course if there was statues I had to have some fun.

The Citadel

View from Citadel

After all that walking and not getting too much sleep, we were tired and headed back to the hostel. It was way past 2, but the time we got there so we were able to check in. We just sat around relaxing and meeting our roommates.
Remember how I mentioned the booze cruise, well we were originally not going to go on it. It was about $30 and we weren't sure if it was going to be worth it. But, after talking to all the people in the hostel that had done it, they said it was totally worth doing. Because with that $30, you also get a champagne bottle. We decided after everyone left that we wanted to do it, so we had to find the sister hostel and find the group. We thankfully did, and we followed the group to the boat. I have to say, I was not dressed in the right clothing because boy was it cold out. I was standing at the front of the boat at one point where you get a great view of the Parliament Building and all I thought about was how frozen I was. I unfortunately didn't take a picture because my phone is non existing and I wasn't going to bring my DSLR with me. We all had such a great time. We meet so many people and everyone was so much fun. That night I met tons of people, but all from English speaking countries (UK, Ireland, Australia, and of course US). I did met one local Hungarian guy. His English was very good and helped us out with translating with the club bouncers. Oh, ya after the booze cruise, we headed off the the club. After my champagne bottle, I was feeling good. One of the English man I met was telling me he had met the love of his life that night, so I of course was trying to help him find her.

Day 3
Again, with a late night and an early start, the whole sleep thing really wasn't happening. We had signed up to go caving, which meant we had to be up and ready to leave at 10 to head over to the caves. The whole lot of us was not feeling that hottest that morning aka we were all hung over (sorry Mom and Dad, but YOBO). With some food and fresh air, I was starting to feel fine. I couldn't say the same for some of my friends. But moving on.... to... CAVING!!!!

Caving I have to say was one of the coolest things I have ever done. And I have done a lot of different cool things. I had to say it was cooler that taking a helicopter over the grand canyon and even snuba diving in Maui (sorry again Mom and Dad, those things were awesome, but this was just something else). But that is just how AWESOME it was. I was totally in my element, with being a nature girl. We got to run around the caves, sliding down rock surfaces, and squeezing our bodies into tight spaces. There were some people with us who were claustrophobic and wanted to take the easy way always, so I definitely didn't feel challenged enough. I would 100% do it again, and hopefully get to do the more challenging parts.

Outfits for Caving

Caving took a lot out of us, seeing how in the morning we were all hung over. We all decided we wanted to go take a nap in the hostel. It was definitely needed. The hostel that night was going to a place called Aqua World. This is a place that would never exist if we were in the states, so we had to go. It is an indoor water park, but it had the atmosphere of a club with a bar inside of it. Crazy right. It was again an incredible night. If you really want more details on it, you will have to just ask me in person.

Day 4 

Thinking about it now, I should have named this blog post the sleepless weekend. I think each night I was function with 4-5 hours of sleep. But being young and all, we all were still pretty functioning. Today was mostly sightseeing stuff. We started the day off with the Grand Market Hall. This is were we got to try some Hungarian food. One of there specialties is stuffed cabbage, so that is what me and my friend Kaylin split. It was tasty. Inside the cabbage was a meat, rice type of mixture. We got to walk around for a while and do some souvenir shopping. 

Grand Market Hall

 We then heading to the Basilica. It was a beautiful building and the interior was incredible. Not that I'm still not amazed at these buildings, but I have been to so many basilicas and cathedrals, they are all starting to blend together for me.

Basilica

 We then head up to the Vajdahunyad Castle and most importantly the thermal baths. It was great to walk around the park and around the Castle. But, I was too excited for the thermal baths. For anyone who has been to Budapest, they always talk about the thermal baths.

Vajdahunyad Castle

The thermal baths were exactly what you would think they are. It is like a giant hot tub outside. For some reason the Hungarian's love whirl pools. We saw them at Aqua World and again at the Thermal Baths. We spent 3 hours at the baths and I think we spent about 2 hours of it in the whirl pool. You get a ton of speed going around it. With a mass amount of people, I was just in constant laughter at all the things that was happening going round and round. We actually ran into our roommate's friend in the whirlpool. It was a total coincidence and what were the odds. But, the thermal baths came at a perfect time because it was so de-stressing and a time for our muscles to relax for all our various activities and walking.

Again, the hostel had some fun plans for the night. This night was a pub crawl through the ruin bars. For us, it was a more chilled out night because we desperately needed it after the last two nights. It was a great girl's night where we all hung out and had a great laugh.

Day 5

Our final day started off with what other than a candy shop. Me and Kaylin could not resist and got this coconut mousse thing with a passion fruit filling. OMG, it was heavenly (am I torturing you yet Dad. Every country I think I have had something amazingly coconut). 

 We next heading to the Szimpla market which at night is a club, but during the day is a market. One thing you should know about Hungry is that their spicy is SPICY. I had been getting used to Ireland's "spicy" being mild, so when we got a sample for one of the vendors, I tried the spicy one. But wow was is spicy. I immediately need a drink of water and I could still feel the burn in my mouth. We also got some of their stew there. We weren't sure what it was but it was some type of cabbage soup/stew thing. Regardless, it was delicious.

Szimpla Market

 Oh also the thing about this market is that it is decorated like a junk yard. They had random things hanging around and an old car was converted into a seat. It was a very different feel and look than any other market I had been to.

Szimpla Market

 After the market, we walked over to the Synagogue in the Jewish Quarter. We just took a look at it, but we were running low on time because our flight was that afternoon.

Synagogue

 Another thing I should mention is all the different street art. What I liked the most is all the different depictions of Buda vs Pest. On the picture on the right, Buda is on the right and Pest is on the left. On the left picture, Buda is on the right and Pest is on the left. It was interesting to see how different the two sides are.

It was a long and tiring weekend, but it was definitely one of my favorites. We did so many different things and got to meet a lot of great people. I could go on for hours talking about this weekend, but I don't have the energy to write that much, plus I would probably just bore people. Sadly, this trip also reminded me how close I am to the end of my semester and all my traveling. It isn't quite over yet. I have one more trip planned!