Budapest again

Its probably fair to say Hungary had a bad 20th century, following a good 19th century. Actually, it was doing ok until the First World War. Then it backed the Germans in World War I and come the peace it lost a much of its territory. Tends to happen when you lose. Then just to repeat the same mistake, the Hungarians backed the Germans again in World War II (do some people never learn?) and switching sides half way through didn't help them. And then of course they came under the iron rule of the communists behind the iron curtain for most of the rest of the century. So a bad century.

But hopefully its on an upward trajectory. Certainly Budapest is a lovely, civilised city. And it still reflects its 19th century heritage in the architecture, plus Seccessionist art and architecture of the early part of the 20th century. Which I spent a fair part of the week exploring. Actually this is my third visit to the City, and as I am a creature of habit stayed at the same hotel as before. But no, not an example of grand Victorian architecture. In a 1970s tower, the Hotel Budapest is undeniably an eyesore. But once inside it, one can enjoy the views looking out over the city or the Buda Hills. And its near a metro station so making it easy to travel around to the sites one does want to see.

On Monday I decided to start my week by going to Margaret Island - essentially an island which is a park. Why start with a park? Well first it was, according to the weather forecast, the one definitely dry day of the week. And secondly, everything closes on a Monday - except you can't really close a park. So, to Margaret Island.

The left bank is largely devoted to sports facilities, including an athletics stadium and a swimming pool with a massive water slide.

The rest holds a number of sculptures, modern and old,

a pretty church

a ruined convent

a grand hotel (actually, the Grand Hotel)

a UNESCO protected water tower

a very pretty Japanese garden

a well (rather a grand one)

a small zoo

and of course some flowers.

As this did only take up a morning, I decided to try and combine it with a walk across the Danube in Obuda. The walk in Obuda was one set out in my guide book. I decided to start the walk halfway through and only do the northern section of it. Only a man with my sense of direction could possibly find, after a fair amount of time, and numerous wrong turns that I was in fact going in the exact opposite direction to what I was expecting, meaning that I found myself at the beginning of the suggested walk, not the end. I just couldn't face going all the way to the end, so I settled on doing the southern half rather than the northern. Which meant, in addition to few nice buildings, seeing the remains of the Roman amphitheatre (not very photogenic) and further Roman ruins amazingly stranded in a traffic island or in the underpasses of a busy square.