Pest

We took the Chain Bridge above the Danube and made our way up Andrassy Ut to Varosligent, the City Park.  There we walked along the Millennium Monument which honors the city’s saint, St. Stephen, whose image is commemorated throughout the city.  The large plaza is decorated with fourteen statues of Hungary’s greatest kings and is flanked by the Museum of Fine Arts on the left and the Muscarnok gallery on the right.  Walking deeper into the park, on the other side of Kos Koroly Setany we visited the Szechanyi baths, a canary-yellow building that more closely resembles government administrative offices rather than a bath house.  Peering through the windows, I observed hundreds of men, women and children bathing in outdoor pools steaming with medicinal waters that allegedly prevent arthritis. 

The city’s Opera House is much smaller than I expected though it does have a stunning red marble interior.  After visiting a seemingly endless number of churches since we’ve moved to Europe, we convinced ourselves to visit the Basilica of St. Stephen, Budapest’s largest church.  Due to the Easter celebration, the saint’s decaying right hand, the “Sacred Right”, was on display for visitors to pay their respects.

Walking around Pest was interesting insofar as it is the area of the central part of the city, but sightseeing-wise, Buda surpasses Pest in terms of richness and architectural beauty.  Prepared to see a city similar to Prague, I was surprised at how different the two, Eastern European capitals are and prefer the hills and sites of Budapest over Prague’s.  While we were prepared to be inundated with classical music in Prague, there was not a restaurant or street, site or store, we walked through where a citizen of the city was not playing a classical music instrument.  We concluded our visit to Budapest by visiting the Royal Palace in Buda where we sat and listened to one man perform Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” in completion by heart.  

The Castle District, Buda

We began our visit with a walk around the Castle District where we visited the Matthias Church and Fishermen’s Bastion. The gothic-style church, much like many of the religious sites we’ve visited elsewhere in Europe, was once converted into a mosque (when the Turks invaded). Although the building was surrounded by low scaffolding, we got a beautiful view of the church’s rooftop from the highest point of Fishermen’s Bastion. The church’s green-and-yellow tiled gingerbread patterned roof jumps out as one of the unique identifiers of the church. Along with the Matthias Church, the Fishermen’s Bastion offers fantastic views of the Danube River close by and Parliament across the river in Pest.

A strategic point from which to view some of the best sites Budapest has to offer, the Fishermen’s Bastion it in itself worthy of a visit. Some tourists liken it to Paris’s Sacre-Coeur. The approach up a hill of steps to the Fishermen’s Bastion is similar to the climb to Paris’s church, and both sites are made of white stone and designed with the Romano style. However, while I appreciated the Fishermen’s Bastion, few sites compete with my fondness for the Sacre-Coeur.

We returned to the Fishermen’s Bastion in the late evening when the site was still and quiet. Bright spot lights along the Danube illuminated the white structure, making it look ghostly in the otherwise dense darkness. Car traffic is prohibited in the Castle District but across the Danube I could see cars racing like ants up and down the Chain Bridge. Parliament’s dome was spectacularly lit in different hues from its foundation, much like New York’s Empire State Building.