2 day train ride

I left Greece - Thessaloniki in the north to be precise - at midnight on the eve of what was to be i thought an endless train ride. it of course was not that bad - not like i was shoved into a cattle car like a sardine but two days on a train is still no picnic.
i did however have my own little room.
here's my little room


and here is the window with a lovely decrepit view outside


here is some dreadful train station in bulgaria somewhere we were stopped at for at least an hour


at each border crossing about 10 border guards got on to check our passports and they even took them away with them. that was really quite unnerveing. however i now have a supremely full passport full of cool stamps! greece bulgaria romania hungary czech germany and some others i think they dont' always stamp it but hey i got some!

once we got to romania we stopped in some town that was tiny with a train station the size of a pin head for 2 HOURS. all i could think at that point was how thirsty and hungry i was and how much i wanted to phone my mother. it was endless. and then we went backwards and forwards about 10 times on the tracks before leaving! HELL it was. that was the hell part of this trip.

it looked nice from the windwo though


i arrived in budapest on the third day at 10am. it's not a good time to arrive in a place. i was so confused and totally knackered but managed to see some sites anyway.
by the way in case you didn't know budapest is split into two different parts - buda and pest! the pest part i think is the more bourgeoise part and buda the bohemian. but i could have that mixed up.
here is gellert hill and the danube


and a big bridge


this if you can believe it is my hostel! the hostel was amazing. really lovely and clean and nice people. they even let me use the phone.

that would be the courtyard


balconies


foyer

then i went to the synagogue which was beautiful. the only european synagogue designed like a christian cathedral




it's name though i can't remember means tobacco.. sort of random. it is on the border of what was the jewish ghetto during the holocaust and was severely damaged but never completely destroyed and at some point was a nazi meeting point i think. they also have a large collection of jewish 'things' i dont' know a better word right now - tapestries, dishes, menorah's all those sorts of cultural items that were all destroyed. these ones were saved because two catholic priests hid the items in the basement of the church. there is a graveyard on the side of this synagogue which is also very unusual but it was built to bury all the victims who died inside the ghetto to give them a place of sacred rest.
in the back they have the memory tree which is an upside down menorah

covered in metal leaves inscribed with donor names.

when i was using the toilet i met a nice girl from poland named catrina. so we walked around the city a bit which was really nice
here is castle hill


here is me and catrina and my scarft i bought in athens that died my neck green in vienna!


then i went home and went out to dinner. i had goulash the cheapest and most hungarian thing i could find on the menu.
then i went home and fell fast asleep.

the next day i went to the market across from the hostel which was really cool. it also had a big supermarket in the basement with really cheap hungarian wine! this is where i got the bull's blood!


while i was in the market an old hungarian woman came up to me knattering a bit and she was really sweet so i made her a tiny paper crane. she was so pleased by it!



then i went to walk around on castle hill


awwwwwwwwww hungarian violets!


here is buda of budapest!






and this is pest


then i went to the turkish baths which was heaven especially becuase it was cold and raining... why why why did i leave the south!!!


here is a tram the trams were lovely!


the next day even though i was warned that i was trying to go to far in one day i went to eger which is where bull's blood is brewed. bull's blood is a red hungarian wine... made from bull's blood. NOOOOOOOOOOO i'm just kidding! the bottle i got was quite nice. yancy and i shared it when i returned

here is the main square and giant pink church in eger.


in the background is the castle


aww how quaint


spot the hungarian doggy!!!


i found the mineret which is 'eger's most photographed structure'. you can even climb it and see a panarama of eger... somehow i decided to pass on that one


i also went to the market. twice. becuase i decided to buy sausage which was greasy and delicious. they really love pussy willow in hungary. the sweetest image i saw was on the train when a woman rode by on her old bike with pussy willow in the basket. and also children playing in a falling apart playground where one stood up and waved to the train at the top of the slide and then promptly went down the slide. beautiful.
anyway here is the market flower stands


the last place i visited in eger was the top of the 'beautiful woman valley'. this is where the winery's are but i didn't have the energy to walk down the hill and then back up again and to the train. but it looks like our happy valley has an international competitor! and this one even has winerys... tough competition


(p.s. grimsby's nickname is happy valley for those of you who didn't get that joke)

i had to use the most disgusting toilet i have ever seen at the train station where you even had to pay 20 froints (which really ='s about 0.000000001 pence or something) but the woman was sweet. but the doors didn't have locks. awful. dreadful. the train ride was fine but we had to stop in this town with the funniest name i have EVER heard


FUZESABONY!! ha ha. it cheered me up all the way to vienna!
this is where i leave you till next place - vienna. i was in vienna for 4 days!