As you know from my previous post, Europe during Christmas is simply magical. As my roommate and I had some time off during Christmas, we decided to take a trip. This was the first Christmas abroad for both of us and it was an interesting experience. We both got to realize the struggles of skyping across time zones as well as the difference in consumerism on holidays. I have always taken it for granted that certain places such as coffee shops and grocery stores will be open during the holidays. When I worked in retail in college I hated working holidays so I did sympathize with the poor unlucky few who had to show up to work with a smile on Christmas Eve.
Of course, even in America, you would usually expect almost all businesses to have limited hours the day before a major holiday and be closed on the day itself. What neither of us expected, however, was a city-wide shutdown for nearly three days.
Our first evening in Budapest we made friends at our hostel and decided to go out on a pub crawl to familiarize ourselves with the city. Conveniently, my friend Michael happened to be passing through Budapest the same night so we got to see him as well. We had a great guide named Lars for our pub crawl and many tasks to complete throughout the night in the form of bingo cards.
The next day, we got up ready to slowly but surely explore the city – after some breakfast of course. Simple enough, right? We could not have been more wrong. It took over an hour of wandering around before we finally found a cafe that closed with twenty minutes of us ordering. A lucky find, though, because the food was good and had a cute Christmas market outside where I was able to buy postcards for my family.
We spent the day exploring all my favorite Budapest sights from Buda Castle to the Parliament building (my favorite building in Europe so far.
If you’ve been to Prague and loved Prague Castle, Buda Castle is going to blow your mind. The castle grounds are free to enter and provide some truly amazing views of the city. During the warmer months there is a cafe/restaurant at the top. If you’re planning a trip to Budapest, the castle is a MUST!
The second day, which happened to be Christmas, we visited the thermal baths. This wasn’t something that I got to do the first time I went to Budapest so it was at the top of my list. The price worked out to be about 500 crowns (roughly $24), but was definitely worth it. The weather was perfect and it was so relaxing to just float around in the water and not worry about lesson planning.
Finding dinner each night was a bit tough as well, but we made it work. Our Christmas dinner featured one of the top five most delicious things I have ever eaten. We found a tapas place near our hostel that had a good ten different vegan dishes. Now vegan and tapas are not two words I typically pair in my mind, but I am not exaggerating when I say that if I were dropped into a pool of this vegan aioli and had to eat my way out of it, I would die happy. I have no idea what they did to make it so incredible, but it is the first and only time I have seen whipped aioli. Seriously, if you’re in Budapest, check this place out. I can’t remember the name, but it is near Bluebird Cafe, which coincidentally has an amazing vegan quesadilla.
Sadly for us, the ruin bars were all closed until the day we left. I would go back to check these out, but as you all know, my travel bucket list is long, so I’ll save those for some day in the future.
All in all, Christmas in Budapest was a blast, but I would recommend bringing some snacks and planning ahead for restaurants to be closed. Dollars convert well in Hungary and everyone we met spoke English. The public transport messages and many signs are also translated, so this is an easy place for English-speakers to visit.
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