After our lecture on Friday, me, Amanda, Rob, Rhylan, TJ, Terrel, Famah, Yashica, and Brian all headed off to find the apartment we were renting for the weekend. I found the place on Housetrip.com which I had used before, but run into a couple of problems with. Having never been to Budapest, I didn't really know anything about the area where I booked the apartment, just that the place looked pretty nice and would sleep 8 (or 9 in our case), and it was cheap. Our Apartment was awesome. It was in this old building in a sorta residential area about a block and a half off of Andrassy Utca, the main shopping street in the city. It was described to us as Budapest's answer to 5th Avenue or Rodeo Drive. It was a gorgeous tree-lined street with shops and restaurants and cafes on it.
Then we got to the apartment and had to wait about an hour before the woman we were renting from got there to let us in and give us the keys. Once we got inside it was great! The building opened into an open air courtyard with the apartments all around the outside of the courtyard. We were on the 1st floor (2nd floor to Americans). We had a full kitchen, crazy nice bathroom, and two living room type areas with sofas that turned into double beds. The living room type rooms each had a loft in them with a double bed as well.
Friday night we just hung out at a little Italian restaurant on a square near our apartment and then at the bar right next to our apartment. My camera broke, so Saturday morning it was off to find me a new camera.
Saturday morning we headed to the West End Mall (yea, I know, we hung out at an American style mall while we were in Budapest) so I could get a new camera and so Amanda and TJ could get tattoos. They each got a version of the Czech Lion that is on a lot of the Czech coins.
After we left the mall it was off to sight-see. I played tour guide, navigating the city and the metro system and getting us to the main places we wanted to see. We definitely ran out of time and didn't see everything (so I guess I'll just have to go back...darn...). We started at St. Stephens Basilica, which was absolutely beautiful. We got there right after a wedding had ended and the wedding party was still taking pictures on the steps, while surrounded by tons of tourists. There really aren't words for how pretty this place is.
Next we headed up to the Parliament Building, staying on the "Pest" (or Pesht as they say in Hungary) side of the city. This was an awesome looking building. The building itself was huge! We couldn't go in, just look around the outside, but that was ok.
From the castle, we headed back to the apartment to drop stuff off, grab jackets, and figure out how to get to Szimpla, a huge bar in the city. We wandered around until we found it after having taken a couple wrong turns due to lack of road signs. This place was huge. I don't think I really got any pictures of it, but wow. We hung out there for a couple hours before heading back to the apartment to sleep. 6 people in a cab made to fit 4 was a crowded/ less than great choice...but, let's face it, one we will probably make again at some point.
Sunday morning was pretty uneventful, just waking up and cleaning up the apartment before leaving to head back to the bus and back to Linz. I can't wait to go back to Budapest at some point, whenever that might be. Great city. If you get the chance, you should definitely go!
Well, today was a long day of lectures at the Raabheim and we head off to Salzburg for the day tomorrow for a lecture about arbitration as it relates to sports. I think we will be talking mostly about the olympics. I can't even begin to describe the epically nerdy levels of excitement right now. So, I'm off to bed! Love y'all!
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