farewell to hungary

Okay, I'm almost done catching you up on our Budapest adventures! Our last day, we woke up, packed up, and headed over to the other side of the Danube from where we were before.

This is Parliament, modeled after the English Parliament building, but obviously with a twist, my favorite building there:

Nearby was this amazing, huge statue of a group of people. Naturally, we recreated it, but I don't have a copy yet...it is pretty amazing. :)

We also quickly checked out St. Stephen's Basilica before checking out of our hostel. It was quite magnificent.
After that, we caught the metro back to our hostel, checked out, and headed back to Maastricht! It was a long ride, and we were pretty hyper on the train. Actually, a lady that had to sit near us was definitely amused at our antics. We also ended up with another couchette instead of just sleeper chairs due to a mix up with our train. So we decided to try sleeping in the seat instead of pulling out the beds-- not something I'd recommend again! But we made it back safely.

Overall, Budapest to me was unexpectedly modern, but with imposing, beautiful buildings of a design I'd never seen before. There were unfortunately more homeless people in this city than most, but at the same time we saw many finely dressed, furry-hatted old ladies, and chubby, bundled-up adorable children. It's a great city to explore, especially on foot and along the Danube River. And we actually never had a problem with language- every restaurant and service had information available in English. I never thought I would travel to Budapest, let alone Hungary, but I am so glad I did!

And in general, our week-long vacation was one of the most amazing weeks I have ever had! It was also a good taste of the planning and preparation that our month of travel will take in April...it is going to be intense. Our group was so great, and I think we really work well together. I can't wait to travel with them all again!