A little Buda and a little Pest

So we were up at for our day of touring in Budapest.  We started our ship life with a nice little breakfast and a little coffee up on the deck of the ship.  The ship we were on is certainly smaller than your traditional ocean cruise ships.  It holds around 170 people.

Anyway, we walked off the boat and on to our bus and headed to our first stop at Hero's square on the Pest side of the town.  Oh, I did not know this, but the city is divided on two sides of the river, the Buda side and Pest side, sort of like East and West De Pere.  The towns merged long ago in 1867.  So anyway Hero's square has an interesting history and serves as central location to quite a few local sightseeing spots.  What was interesting was having natives at all of our stops be our guides.  The impact the communist had on Hungry and what the liberation means to the citizens is still evident today. Our guide told us a touching story about after the liberation the story of the funeral for the leader of the resistance and reburial.

We then drove around the city and saw a number of the highlights and heard the stories about the resurgence and the rebirth of the city that was still coming to life after the end of communism in 1989. This is a beautiful city.  We headed over to the Buda side of the river and got out and went to Castle Hill, where we toured Matthias Church, and we looked over the famous Fisherman Bastion.  After the touring we figured we could wander around the Castle Hill area and we explored some parts of the old castle areas and the former castle that is now an art museum. After a few hours of this we headed back to the ship and hung out.

The ship set sail around four and we hung out on the top of the ship as we sailed past the sites.  It was a nice evening for it.  Even after dinner we headed up to the top to take in the sights and talk with our new friends about what everyone did that day.  We figured out we missed the best stop by not going to the farmers market where you could get some great paprika.  Well, I guess that will be next time.