Awaking from a slumber that challenged sleeping beauty for soundness, Marie and I first headed for the West side of the city - Buda.

Starting with Buda Castle which is naturally situated on top of Buda Hill, this (reconstructed) castle use to house the previous Kings and Queens of Hungary. The Castle is now home to a number of Museums, art galleries and homes for caretakers. The castle has a slightly more modern feel then most other one I have visited. We spent a couple hours strolling around the nooks and crannies of the old town, which is situated inside the castle walls. This time – the hill climb gave us good vistas of the city in the day time.

A sudden brust from the heavens forced us to investigate the underground Caves. What was a natural labyrinth of tunnels was converted some centuries ago into a brick walled vault, which was used for storage, dungeons, dragons, and any other mythical use you can think of. They had tried to be ‘arty’ and ‘modern’ with the caves. There were bizarre drumbeats, obscure statues, underground flowing wine and random mood lighting. Worth the time purely for the ‘errr… what did we just see factor’. Reappearing, the sun was out and it was time for some lunch. We never really discovered what was traditional Hungarian food, but we did have a bit of yummy goulash.

Deciding to leave the natural spring baths for the East (Pest) side the next day, we walked further down the river to a public park on an island in the middle of the river. It was nice and we lay down on the grass for a couple of hours listening to various bands. Feeling refreshed we investigated the parliament building which is obviously copied from the gothic parliament buildings situated in London. They even admit to it. Few more hours were consumed investigating shops before finding a restaurant for a nice meal.