Budapest: Churches and Synagogue

The day after Easter Sunday was one of the brightest, sunniest days of our river-cruise trip in March.  So you won't be surprised that we packed it to the gills!

Our first mission (so to speak...since this is a post about churches), was to see the Dohány Street Synagogue on the Pest side of the Danube.  But on the way...

...we stopped in at this wee church first.

Remember, this was the Monday morning after Easter.

And then we saw the aftermath of a car accident...our first of the entire trip.

Everything about it appeared as though it could have been anywhere!

There she was...just as we had remembered on our Viking excursion when we drove by the previous Friday.

This time we were on foot and could see it up close and personal.

The Dohány Street Synagogue, from 1859, is Europe's largest, seating 3,000.

Sadly, it wasn't open...but we saw a lot!

 I was especially mesmerized by all the Stars of David mixed in with the design and architecture.

We peeked through every gate and crevice possible....

...especially at the Memorial of the Hungarian Jewish Martyrs, resembling a weeping willow (1989).

The leaves bear the names of over 400,000 Hungarian Jews murdered by the Nazis.

I just wish we could have gone inside to see the names!

Have you ever wanted to learn Hebrew?  I have.

(click any collage to enlarge)

It's the kind of place where you just want to sit and soak it all in!

It so happens that there was an advertisement inside the memorial courtyard that pointed out a Flodni (apple-walnut-poppy-seed pastry) café just down the street.  And since it was about that time....

...oh, YES.  Just what the doctor ordered.  Rachel's flodni, to be precise.  

She's "one of the queens of Budapest Jewish cooking. The daughter of a noted rabbi."

Doesn't get more authentic than that...just a few doors down from the synagogue!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Newly energized, we headed off to another of Budapest's famous churches but stopped off first at the nearby Opera House.

The Hungarian State Opera House, from 1875, is Hungary's largest opera building.

Lucky for us, we were able to step inside the lobby and get a glimpse of the grandeur.

The outside wasn't bad either!  (Look at that imp!)

Like I said, we were on our way to see another church, the grand St. Stephen's Basilica from 1905.  It's the third largest church building in present-day Hungary, according to Wiki.

 If that doesn't grab your attention, wait till you go inside.

And yes, that's a souvenir-coin machine right at the door before going in!

Sometimes there's nothing you can say!

"At the feet of Jesus" came to mind.

 ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Near St. Stephen's we found the metro station and headed across the Danube to the Buda side of the city.  Remember all those churches we saw, clustered near the Matthias Church?

To refresh your mind, see all those steeples?  Yup!

We wanted to see what we could of the other churches.

 This Elizabeth Temple was on a side street on our way to another church...and wasn't open.

This Church of St. Anne, from 1762, was open...at least for the inside glassed foyer.

It's amazing what pictures you can still take without going all the way inside!

But this Church of Szilágyi Dezso, from 1896, was the one I so hoped was open...but wasn't.  

Well, at least it was a treat to behold on the outside.  Look at those colored roof tiles!

By then it was time to eat supper and go home.  So we did.

And what a great choice it was!

You can never go wrong with a nautical theme...for us!

And because this was our last time on the Buda side of the city, I just had to capture the famous icons again:

the Parliament (looking back to the Pest side), the Margaret Bridge, and the Chain Bridge.

By now you should have all these landmarks down pat, right?!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Other impressions from the day...

...more impressions...

...and more impressions.

This, my friends, is Budapest, with one more day left to go....

Budapest: Margaret Bridge and Island

A couple posts back I showed you this collage of the Margaret Bridge, seen our second day in Budapest while we were out walking about:

Interestingly, it's the Chain Bridge that most tourists want to see, as seen in my post here.

But our tour guide told us her favorite was the Margaret Bridge, because of the kink in it here.

You can also see it in the top-right image above.

To give some perspective, here are 7 of Budapest's 8 bridges:
(click to enlarge)

In the center is the Chain Bridge, where our Viking boat docked.

Right side of the Danube is Pest.  Left side is Buda.

And see the island?  That's where we spent our Easter Sunday!

But first, we had to get there from our hotel, down south and east outside of this map...which we did via public transportation, as you know from my last post here. 

Along the way...impressions.  Always something to grab the eye...like the top-right Liberty Statue.

Truth is, we had planned to take the Hop-On, Hop-Off bus to see her...

...but when we got to those green umbrellas, we were told our travel pass did not include their buses.

Bummer.  So we just got more impressions!

And since we were in the area of the Elizabeth Bridge (south of the Chain Bridge), we had a chance to peek inside the Inner City Parish Church nearby, following their morning service.

It's the oldest church in Pest, founded in 1046.

 And since it was Easter Sunday, after all, I'm glad we had a chance to visit a church!

But our mission for the day was to get to the Margaret Bridge and cross it halfway to get to the island.

It's Budapest's second oldest bridge, from 1876 (the Chain Bridge is from 1849).

Up to this point, it had been raining off and on all morning but stopped the minute we set foot on the island!

Margaret Island is 2.5 km (1.6 mi) long and 500 metres (550 yards) wide, 

in between the Margaret and Arpad bridges.

Our goal was to walk it from one end to the other.

See the mistletoe?  Did we stop and kiss each other?

  The Centennial Memorial from 1973 commemorates the city's hundreth anniversary of unification.

 There is a 5350 metre long, rubber-coated jogging track around the island, marked at 500 metre intervals,

which was nice to see being used.  Other than that, we were alone!

And the farther north we walked, the farther behind the familiar landmarks became.

Margaret Island is a recreational park nowadays, with various sports establishments, like tennis and swimming. However, formerly "the island was dominated by nunneries, churches and cloisters until the 16th century. During the Ottoman wars the monks and nuns fled and the buildings were destroyed."  (Wiki) 

 These are the 13th century ruins of a Franciscan church.

This church is a Premonstratensian chapel with a Romanesque tower from the 12th century.

And yes, we tried to get into it...to no avail.

The water tower, under rennovation/cleaning (?), was built in 1911, at 57 meters high.

To be honest, it felt like the entire island was "shut down" until we got to the hotels at the north end.

But we did pass a tiny zoo with exoctic waterfowl...

...and lots of statues as we neared the thermal spa area of one of the hotels.

The music fountain, bottom-left, was dead as a doornail...but then it WAS still winter.

Once we rounded the thermal spas, we saw the 2 hotels and picked one for our late-afternoon lunch.

Just exactly what the doctor ordered.  (Didn't even take pictures of that, I see!)

And since we were now at the north end of the island, instead of walking all the way back to the Margaret Bridge, we took the nearby Arpad Bridge to catch the metro back to our hotel.

All this on a lazy and Mother-Nature Easter Sunday.

Budapest, Hungary: the Chain Bridge and Parliament Area

From this point on, Budapest was on our own...starting officially after breakfast on the Saturday before Easter.  I say "officially" because since our hotel wasn't ready for check-in till 2p, Viking encouraged us to stay in the vicinity and eat lunch onboard, which we did.

So in this post, I'm showing what we saw by walking around the vicinity of the Chain Bridge where our boat was docked.

When I say we were docked at the Chain Bridge, I mean it. 

In fact, 3 of these images above were taken while on the bridge...but more on that later.

As we left the boat, we were on another mission....

...while passing the views of the churches on the Buda/opposite side of the Danube river.

You've already seen up-close-and-personal the Matthias Church from my last post.

You'll see some of the other churches in a later post.

Right then we were on this side of the Danube, on a mission to see...

...the most disturbing sight of our entire trip.

The Shoes on the Danube is a 2005 memorial honoring the Jews killed by fascist Arrow Cross militiamen during WWII.  Men, women and children were "forced to strip naked on the banks of the Danube and face the river; a firing squad then shot the prisoners at close range in the back so that they fell into the river to be washed away. This was a common practice that occurred during 1944-1945."

I can't think of any war memorial anywhere that has affected me as deeply.

And as you see, it was only meters away from our Chain Bridge docking.

Let our hearts be broken...and lest we forget!

 After composing ourselves...we continued our walk along the promenade past the Parliament building.

It's usually best seen from the other side of the river but, for now, here it is up-close.

We actually walked around it and saw the back side, which was almost as nice.

Once around the Parliament, we headed back to the promenade on the other side of the Chain Bridge.

You know I'm a glutton for these bronze statues, especially when Astrid joins the shot.

The most famous is the Little Princess, from 1989, created by László Marton,

inspired by his eldest daughter from his first marriage.

I love that she looks like an impish tomboy.  HA!

From the promenade we walked inland to Vorosmarty Square for the Easter Fair.

Have you ever had rooster testicles stew (top middle image)???

(And yes, the poor we always have with us!)

This was fun.  Very Hungarian, apparently.

But I started singing "Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier" when I saw all those fur hats!

(click any collage to enlarge)

And while there, this band was playing...

 ...with these children watching, mesmerized.

I wished like the dickens I could understand Hungarian!

Now, head back with us to the Chain Bridge to close the loop.

This time we walked across the bridge, over the Danube, to the Buda side of Budapest.

To the left of the bridge is the Royal Palace, if you remember it from my last post,

and the Castle Hill Funicular that takes you to the top to see it.

And there's Matthias Church again.  See, you're getting acclimated to this incredible city!

Now, turn around and go back across the bridge to the Pest side.

And that's when you see these fabulous views of the Parliament!

How can you say NO to that!

At this point it was time to eat lunch back on the ship, while new passengers were boarding.

It was our unofficial last Good-Bye to the Viking Grand European Tour we had just experienced
for 2 incredible weeks.

Along the way of that day....impressions.

And more impressions.

We even had a sneak preview of the Margaret Bridge,

which we would cross the next day to Margaret Island....

...to be continued...