We arrived to a gray and rainy afternoon in Budapest almost exactly 24 hours after we left Santa Cruz. We started early on a super packed day at SFO. We only had about 15 minutes after clearing security to board our flight.
Part of the motivation for taking this trip was the great deal we got on our tickets. I found them by chance back in September on one of those evenings just after school was back in session. Looking ahead at the entire school year… with a challenging schedule, night class, and no travel plans… was making the wine go down easy. We actually found business class tickets on air miles with United. They were “saver” tickets which meant at least one leg wasn’t in business, that we would have to fly partner airlines, and that our choices of dates would be limited. Needless to say, none of these were very great burdens! Charlie snapped up the tickets with his hoarded miles and I started reading restaurant reviews online.
Our first leg was from SFO to Denver. Luckily, this short flight was the only one we had to fly in coach. Unfortunately, due to our tickets being purchased with miles, we faced a five-hour layover in Denver as there was no room on the later flight for tickets with our booking class. I will never understand the complex algorithms that the airlines use to figure all this stuff out.
The layover in Denver was fine. We had a nice lunch at a great restaurant and spent the remainder of the time hanging out in the United lounge charging everything and doing some reading.
Our long flight was on Lufthansa to Frankfurt. We enjoyed the extra room, booze, and food in business class and landed a short eight hours later in Frankfurt.
We had a short connection there which we barely made due to the very un-German disorganized airport. We ended up having to clear security again and they were very grumpy about all of my electronics. At SFO I hadn’t taken a single thing out of my bags – not even liquids – and had no issue. Here they took EVERYTHING out of my backpack and dumped it into two buckets. My camera, extra lenses, kindle, liquids, etc. I wouldn’t have been so annoyed except there wasn’t a single sign in the security line telling passengers what they needed to remove. The only video they had only showed that everything, even suitcases, had to go in bins. We skidded in at our gate and walked right on to our final one hour flight. We decided to have the hotel car pick us up from the airport which turned out to be a fantastic decision. Our kind driver was waiting with a little sign and swept us through traffic right to the front doors of our hotel. Yes, we could have saved a little money and taken the train or bus to get there, but we have decided we are going to do everything we can to make this short trip easy, relaxing, and fun.
We have been talking about visiting Hungary for some time as Charlie’s grandmother was born here. We have heard it is a beautiful city, and I wanted to go somewhere that would be completely new for both of us. I like traveling in cool weather as hats and scarves make me much happier than sunburns and humidity.
We took a nice break at the hotel to unpack and have a little rest. Charlie didn’t sleep nearly as many hours as I did on the plane so he needed a little nap. Around 4:30 we walked a few blocks to the Jewish quarter and a little ally called Gozsdu udvar. A once a week craft market lines an indoor ally filled with tiny bars and restaurants. We took advantage of our one chance to catch this market and eagerly chatted with the artists while checking out their work. Unfortunately, I forgot to pull out my camera as we were there at the end and trying to see everything before they closed up shop.
Around the corner was a food truck roundup called “Karavan”. We thought we might find an easy dinner there so we took a look. Things looked delicious but nothing really seemed like what we wanted to eat, and eating in the cold and rain at a picnic table just wasn’t going to work.
As usual, I had done some research and had a backup plan. Near our hotel was a highly recommended restaurant serving “Hungarian Tapas” of sorts. We love eating at Tapas places so we headed that way. We absolutely made the right decision and they managed to squeeze us in without a reservation. “Ket Szerecsen” turned out to be a “Hungarian Tapas” restaurant with both Spanish and Moroccan influences. We ordered four small plates, some house red wine and a beer that Charlie thought might be Hungarian.
Top to bottom: Goulash soup, grilled goat cheese with applesauce and nuts, Moroccan stuffed chicken rolls, Patatas Bravas, and fresh bread.
Dinner was wonderful and only $8100 Forint – about $30. The conversions are proving to be a challenge – as is always the case when the currencies are separated by so many extra zeroes.
After dinner, we wandered back to the hotel checking out our neighborhood. It seems every street is lined with a million bars and restaurants. So many choices and so little time!
We managed to stay up until 8:30 and then both fell asleep quickly in our quiet and comfortable hotel. The weather should be better tomorrow and I can’t wait to see more of the city.