Budapest - Day Two

As many of you know, Hawaii was almost my destination this year. I saw a post from my cousin's sister (my cousin of course) that I was going to visit asking for prayers for her sister because she was in a tsunami warning! So my vacation could have been a lot different.

Today finds me very, very tired. I was very close to taking a nap, but I don't want to waste any time here. I could easily use two days for Budapest, which just means I need to come back.

I would like to visit some museums, which I have not been to any this trip. Most of my efforts have been to visit certain areas of interest so that has been my focus.

We started the morning visiting Hero's Square, which I went to yesterday. I am glad I had been there for a couple of reason. The main is that it was pouring down rain, and it's been the coldest today that it has been all vacation. I also would not have discovered the palace behind the square as we were only there for fifteen minutes.

There are some good sides to organized traveled (not having to worry about booking hotel, not having to worry about inter-country travel being the biggest). Then depending on the travel company and their key demographics there could be some major annoyances. Key words being viewing vs. visiting. I think I talked about this a few year's back. I can say that I have been able to visit the places I really wanted to see.

The other thing is that I need to get back to July / August vacations. It is cold and the days are shorter. My camera sucks at night pictures. Did I mention we fell back last night? The extra hour of sleep did me good, but it also means an hour less daylight. I get to do it all over again when I get home.

We then went to Castle Hill on the Buda side where we saw really great views of Pest. We went to Mount Geller and Matthias Coronation Church. We couldn't go inside because today is Sunday and there was a service going on.

I got dropped off at the Jewish Quarter so I could see the Great Synagogue, which is is the second biggest in the world. I then just walked around focusing on the Danube River edge. I walked across one of the bridges back to the Buda side then walked back over to the Pest side. By then it had stopped raining but was cold.

I got back to the hotel and chilled for a minute. Now I am hungry and trying to figure out if I should have an early dinner or wait it out for a few hours.

Tomorrow I spend the morning in Budapest going to the Parliament, St. Stephen's Basilica, and the Great Market. Then we drive to Vienna. I will attend a Mozart concert tomorrow night.

I am very glad I came on this trip. So far I certainly want to return to all of the locations and spend more time.