Budapest to Amsterdam 2022
We didn't plan on doing a European River trip, but our friend Afie had booked one a few years back and with everything going on it had to be postponed, and postponed, and postponed. She was really hoping that someone like us would want to come so she didn't have to do the whole trip with strangers. She sent us the itinerary and surprisingly outside of Budapest and Amsterdam there was a lot of stops at cities we haven't been to before, and that's usually my criteria for planning trips... somewhere new.
Sept 27
After a couple weeks exploring Iceland, we were on our way to Budapest via Wizz Air (I
know, I haven't heard of them either).
The next chapter of our trip was a river cruise on Emerald Waterways from Budapest to
Amsterdam.
Wizz air is definitely a low cost airline, seats don't recline, and they charge for everything including water and Tea... definitely no entertainment on this flight except for the "is there a doctor or nurse on the flight" announcement to help an old lady who seemed to be having some heart issues. Luckily a just graduated medical student and a gynecologist stepped up and helped her, and she was able to walk off the flight 2 hours later with some assistance.
We arrived at the Annabelle B&B in Budapest around Midnight with the time change, slow to arrive luggage, and one of the worst taxi desk lineups seen at any international airport. Luckily we had been given door codes and key codes in advance and were quickly and quietly in our large room for the night.Much nicer than expected, and way better than the last time we were in Budapest, the place even had a chandelier on it's 10 foot tall ceilings.
Sept 28
We woke up in Budapest and went for our breakfast portion of the B&B, where we were greeted by Andy, he ensured we got a good assortment of breakfast items and a little extra scrambled eggs in case some of it accidentally fell on the floor.
Our lovely view
We have an entire free day to go and re-explore Budapest, and since we are staying right next to the parliament buildings in Budapest, seemed like a really good place to start exploring. We said goodbye to Andy and headed out.
The entire area around the parliament buildings is quite magnificent, for most cities one lap of this structure and it's considered a full day with a wide variety of buildings and architecture..
We noticed an art piece along the river bank consisting of a row of abandoned shoes, all these different shoes represent the different individual Jewish people who were murdered on the riverbanks. It was one of two dark memorials we saw that day. The second was the 1956 Museum of the Hungarian Revolution, where soldiers opened fire on civilians protesting the Russian occupation of Hungary. The bullet holes are on the building are still highlighted with bronze markings.
You may have heard me talk about this in the past, but an easy way to get to know the layout of a city, and also move easily between key landmarks is the local Hop-On, Hop-Off tour buses. We found a Hop-On, Hop-Off bus and decided to use that to get around the city since the main bridge was closed to pedestrians.
After listening to the stories of the structures and the history of the Pest side of Budapest for a while, our first stop was the Heroes Square. Site of the iconic Millennium Monument with statues featuring the Seven chieftains of the Magyars and other important Hungarian national leaders
Vajdahunyad vára (castle) is a castle in the City Park (Varosliget) of Budapest. Built in 1896, it is a copy of Hunyad Castle, known as Corvin Castle in Hunedoara, Romania.
Anonymous Statue pays tribute to the nameless storyteller and the first medieval Hungarian chronicler. The inscription in Latin below translates to "the notary of the most glorious King Béla." Locals believe that touching the figure's pen makes you a better writer, the pen is the shiniest part of the statue..
The next area we got off at was by the beautiful Budapest train station, it's where we arrived in Budapest in 2007.
Norine may have brought this fabric home
After a brief shopping expedition we got back on the bus to cross the Danube and enter Buda's hill-side.
The view across the Danube at Buda's Castle Hill
Before heading up the hill, we pass the famous Gellert Hotel and Spa. Gellert Spa is one of the most famous thermal spa baths in Europe, and one of the leading natural hot spring spa baths in Budapest. After all of our outdoor spa baths in Iceland, inside a dusky old hotel just didn't appeal to us.
Buda Castle is the historical castle and palace complex of the Hungarian Kings in Budapest. It was first completed in 1265, although the massive Baroque palace today occupying most of the site was built between 1749 and 1769.
Matthias Church is one of the finest churches in Budapest, and the most unique churches in Europe. Located atop the Buda Castle hill, it has been serving the citizens of the Buda Castle Hill since 1015, its foundation by the first Hungarian king. Some people say they get bored with churches. We don't get bored, especially when they look like this..
Again, there is a small fee to enter the church and climb the tower, but we missed the cutoff time for the tower, so we saved some money. You walk through an amazing wooden carved door and are blown away by the size and colours inside.
Up some stairs you see more artifacts on display and enjoy the views inside of the church.
Then you leave the church by the same wooden door, and come out into the courtyard of the Halászbástya. Fisherman's Bastion (Halászbástya) was built from 1895 to 1902. It consists of 7 turrets to represent the 7 Hungarian tribes who founded the present day country in 895. The area was protected by the guild of the fishermen during the Middle Ages, hence the name.
There's a fee to go onto some sections of the Bastion, you know, the sections that
tourists will pay to get the best views from. After some frustrating credit card payment
moments, we paid, and then watched at the other end as local teens just jumped the
turnstiles.
All that money we could have saved.
Some people like the statues and the towers, I like all the critters.
The views looking across at Pest and the parliament buildings from the upper castle area
and the Fisherman's Bastion are amazing.
It's a bit of a hike and many stairs down to the river if you don't use the funicular, but the views are still great.
We eventually found the correct location for the Hop-On Hop-Off, and got back on the bus to head back to the Pest side of the river. It seems every street you wander down there is something unique to see.
Some people may say I took too many pictures of the parliament buildings, I say I took just enough, I mean,the angles changed, the lighting changed...
Just around the corner from our B&B is Tulipán Presszó, seemed like a good place for dinner. It's a small bar like restaurant, but the food was very good and so was the service.
Sept 29
Today was the big day, the day that we board our ship, but not until after 2:00pm. So after another breakfast with Andy we left our luggage at the B&B and walked by the parliament buildings again. Since our ticket was still good we rode around the entire city on the Hop-on Hop-off bus again just to enjoy the views and the history lessons... when they weren't interrupted by the lady screaming out the stop numbers as we went. She didn't even need a microphone, but she had one.
Remember what I said about too many pictures of the parliament... ok, maybe I'm pushing it now. But look at that last photo!
We finished our repeat tour with enough time to collect our luggage and catch a cab to our ship, the Emerald Destiny. Our cab pulled up by the ship, and before we could even get out of the cab and pay, 4 Emerald employees were welcoming us and taking our luggage. At least I hope they were Emerald employees.
We check in at reception, and then are taken to our room, and given a full run through of how everything works.
On the TV is a running documentary about safety and rules on board the ship. It's a nice big room, especially compared to some of the places we had stayed at before. It even has a full window that slides down to become an open balcony view.
The view out our window, before and after the fuel barge pulled up
We took a quick wander to familiarize ourselves with the layout before we were called for the first of our Port Talks in the lounge. This is where we finally met up with our friend Afie, who convinced us to come on this cruise. Next up was the first of our many meals on this trip.It's a good thing my belt has a few extra holes. We have befriended a couple from Vermont, and would end up spending most of our meals together.
The Lounge 
The Dining Room
The Bar The Pool
The Upper Deck
Turns out a ship that should hold around 150 passengers only has 70, and most of them are Canadian, including a couple that lives just a few blocks away from us. Even though the ship is at half capacity, they still have the same number of staff members.
The first night on board, we cruised down the Danube during a Hungarian folklore show, which finished just in time to see the parliament building lit up at night, then redocked for our morning excursions in Budapest.
Norine's fine bottle balancing skills
Surely you can't complain if I took more parliament building pictures when it's all lit up at night?
As we are docking, we made our way back down to the lounge for a couple drinks. After putting on my IT hat to help our friend Afie try and solve an e-mail-just-isn't-working problem, (solved by creating a gmail account for her the next day) we closed the bar down and went to bed.
Sept 30
We woke up for a quick breakfast and then headed out for our 'Active' tour. The excursions are broken up into 3 types, the regular tour bus type excursions, the sign up if you want to be more active excursions, and the pay more if you want to do this excursion.
Since we had already explored Budapest on our own, we chose to do a hike to the top of Gellert hill where the Liberty statue is. A small group of 7 of us joined our activity guide Harry on the hike. The first part in the rain was a steep walk with a mix of trails and stairs, leading to great views and a fenced off area where the monuments are, as the area was being refurbished.
The walk down was much easier, on the opposite side of the hill, past a waterfall and across the Elizabeth bridge.
The craziest thing I've ever seen, a restaurant that serves almost everything, this is just a sampling, they also had kangaroo, alligator, ostrich. We didn't eat there.
From there we chose to spend some time wandering the historical city market.
After a few key acquisitions, chocolate and some drinks to take back, we walked the riverside back to our ship in time for it to leave Budapest and head towards Bratislava, Slovakia.
The first trek of our tour would be along the Danube River. We passed some unique little towns and a mix of churches and even a castle at Visegrád as the rain had stopped and we could sit on the top deck and watch the scenery go by.
One of the towns we passed was Visegrád. After the Mongol invasion, King Béla IV of Hungary had a new fortification system constructed in the 1240s and 1250s near the one destroyed earlier. The first part of the new system was the Upper Castle on top of the hill. The Lower Castle is the part of the fortification system that connects the Upper Castle with the Danube. In its centre rises the Solomon Tower, a large, hexagonal residential tower dating from the 13th century.
After another great dinner we were treated to a "not quite Diamond" Neil Diamond impersonator... our activity director and morning tour guide Harry. After the covid delays and concerns that passengers might not come back to cruising, our travel agent gave each of us a generous bar and drink credit... Once again we closed the bar.