#  >  > Non Asia Travel Forums >  >  > Travel the World Travellers Tales Forum >  >  Budapest 2012

## Neo

I've just returned from a week in Hungary, and it was brilliant, it's a country of contrasts, rich and poor, old and new, urban and rural, the people were friendly and the environment was clean, even in Budapest which had the cleanest air of a Capital city that I can ever recall

The weather was excellent, mid 20's to 30's Celsius which is normal for this time of year and the food was fantastic, very rich flavors and lots of peppers.
The highlight of the trip was Budapest and so I'll post some pictures of there for you to view. 

I stayed at the Ibis Hotel, Heroes Square. Just outside the centre, but still plenty to see in the neighbourhood and excellent connections. The room was standard Ibis fare. Near bed folded back into a sofa.



Heroes Square, just a two minute walk up the street. It's dedicated to the founding heroes and legends of Hungary with Gabriel atop the pedestal.



The Fine Arts Museum is on one side of the square. Budapest is full of impressive architecture and I didn't know the significance of most of what I was photographing



Bronzes at the base of the pedestal



A Chateau by a lake behind the square 



The entrance to the Metro station, which was directly underneath down a single flight of steps, the Metro was the first electrified underground train in Europe, though not in the world. (London was the first)



Lots of Thai restaurants and happy massage parlours in Budapest.



Clean street with street decor



One of the numerous open spaces in the city centre







More to follow...  :Wink:

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## Bangyai

Looks like a place worth visiting ( if I could afford it )  . Nice to see such clean , well kept streets. Bit of a contrast to London these days. What was the cost of living like ?

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## Neo

It was reasonably cheap in Budapest city centre, most likely because it hasn't changed over to the Euro. Food and alcohol was 10-20% cheaper than most Euro capitals. Although many restaurants and shops were catering to the local affluent society, more reasonable options were never far away.General clothes and electricals could be bought cheaper in UK. 

Not sure about out in the suburbs, though I'm sure it must be cheaper still, as I never had to put my hand in my pocket. Will certainly be going back as the gf is from there, and possibly looking to relocate in the long term.

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## Neo

more to follow...  :Wink:

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## david44

Gellert Baths one of the many Furdo in Buda is well worth a dip.The two cities were there because of the waters.Theres a very nice cafe Rooseveldts in thePark past Morisz SzigismundKorut.Pest can be be abit rough at night Jobbik thugs roamig Roma and Anglo stag night piss artistes ,fortunaetely living in a suburban vineyard at Kelenvolgy Raiffeissenasse spared me from overly contact with the great unwashed.  Had some rare nights inUjpest where a Scots conman ran a religion and gypsy barbecues once chickens strangled.

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## nigelandjan

Fantastic pics again Rob ,, green already in your bin ,,, however I have taken a leaf from your book and just treated myself to a new GX ! , so if and when I get the hang of it , I shall be posting some of them up .

    You are a talented photographer IMHO  :Smile:

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## Necron99

Lived in Buda for a year back in the 90's. Picturesque but nothing worked.

I did however love the game resteraunts. A very good one on top of the big hill with the peace statue shown in one of your pics.

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## blue

Agree some nice pics ,  I like the pigeon best 




> just treated myself to a new GX !


come again ?
whats that's in English

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## natalie8

Great thread Neo. I especially love the shot of the woman walking through the arches.

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## nigelandjan

> come again ?
> whats that's in English


One of these babies Bluey

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## Neo

That really is a great camera which will give you good results straight out the box and with practice some superb pictures. It's also got fantastic movie capability.  :Yup: 
I must admit to being lazy with mine this time and never taking it off the AI setting, even in the night shots that I will post later, which could have used manual adjustment, but are just about good enough. 

I use the manual settings when I have a bit more time to compose a shot, when shooting in midday light or low light and when shooting in very contrasting light, but getting it right takes practice and a little inspiration. 

You must have seen some of the threads by Bustak..? Probably the best photographer to have graced Teakdoor and a great example of what can be achieved with the type of camera that you have. 
Here's one of his best https://teakdoor.com/chiang-mai-forum...lumix-lx3.html , don't worry, I get jealous of his ability too  :Very Happy: 

I look forward to seeing some of your pics  :Wink:

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## Neo

Oh, and thanks for all the greens folks, much appreciated  :Wink:

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## Neo



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## Mr Earl

excellent pics, very good composition. 
I haven't been to Budapest yet,, Thanks.

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## terry57

Great pics mate.

Seems like quite a quiet place yer ?

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## Bettyboo

Good pics, Neo. I only went to Budapest once, but I really enjoyed it. I'd post some pics, but they're mostly of my g/f at that time, a Romanian model with large breasts. I don't want the thread to go off track, so I'll await permission, or not, from the OP.

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## Neo

> Great pics mate.
> 
> Seems like quite a quiet place yer ?


Probably right, for a capital city it never felt crowded or hectic, just got a bit busier for an hour or so in rush hour. I''m sure it has it's moments, but for our time there it seemed laid back.




> Good pics, Neo. I only went to Budapest once, but I really enjoyed it. I'd post some pics, but they're mostly of my g/f at that time, a Romanian model with large breasts. I don't want the thread to go off track, so I'll await permission, or not, from the OP.


Get 'em out for the lads!  :Very Happy:

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## Cujo

Wow, great travel/pic thread Neo, thanks.
That looks like a great place, never occurred to me as a place to visit.
I'd green you but got to spread the love a bit first.

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## Neo

This is the Ibis we stayed at in Heroes Square



The park nearby... restaurant on the lake



trampolines.. table tennis.. playgrounds.. plenty to keep kids occupied



the city zoo, a circus and a funfair complete with wooden roller coaster, all on the same street



and swimming baths too... there really is plenty to do here.



These bad boys are call apple peppers.. about a 7/10 on the chilli scale, hotter than a jalepeno and juicy too. They were soaked in pickle and went down well with lunch and a few cold beers. 



From the bizarre..



..to the sublime. Statue of Gabriel atop Hereos Square.



Impressive scale.

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## nigelandjan

I had not seen those pics mate thanks of rthe link ,, God I was gonna have a shower 40 mins ago !

     Your camera handles those Vodaphone reds superbly ,, do you take your pics on 640+480 ? or 10million plus and then resize them before posting here ?

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## natalie8

Great architecture, cleanliness and the weather! I'm surprised as to how nice a warm it is there.

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## Neo

> do you take your pics on 640+480 ? or 10million plus and then resize them before posting here ?


Yes I generally take them on larger formats and finer resolutions and then resize, I don't often crop pictures, but having a larger picture with higher resolution gives more options for the final result. It also depends on memory card capacity, I don't think I had it on the highest resolutions this time because I knew I'd need to store a lot of pics. The thing you need to watch out for really is over sharpening of the pictures, most notable on telegraph lines, fine edges and railings, they get a kind of twisted effect and look unnatural. It's a good indicator of when you are pushing the visual limit, a slightly softer resolution will usually give a more natural picture.

I'm not one for effects or post processing, if it's good.. it's good. I use FastStone Image Viewer to preview, re-size etc.. it can reduce sharpening, and get rid of my often slanted horizons as well of plenty of other uses... it's very handy, you can view images full screen and then use the floating sidebars for options, or just use the left-right keys to scroll and then the mouse for options. Download FastStone Image Viewer 4.6 - FileHippo.com




> Great architecture, cleanliness and the weather! I'm surprised as to how nice a warm it is there.


Yes the weather was lovely, very Continental as in it's either very cold or very warm and stable for long periods, they grow some great wine out there, and in many ways it was reminiscent of France.. a huge contrast to our return to London, wet, windy and 7c  :Yup:   :Sad:

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## nigelandjan

cheers for the help mate and the link although I have a Mac and not windows

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## Butterfly

I haven't visited Budapest over 20 years, it seems to have changed a lot in positive terms

it used to be dark and polluted, but now with the EU introduction, the place has dramatically improved

will need to visit again, great pics

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## Boon Mee

Great pics, Neo. 

I remember lots of Chess matches around the parks going on at all hours.  If you fancied a game and a wager you could join in.

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## Bettyboo

Some Budapest pics; I can't find the best ones... I'll keep looking.

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## Necron99

> Some Budapest pics; I can't find the best ones... I'll keep looking.


 
The fishermans fairytale castle in the back is a bizzare addition to a medieval fortress.  I used to walk through the castle on my way to work, could never make up my mind if I loved or hated it.

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## oldjimbo

Some great pics of Budapest and lots of interesting posts. Thanks men (and ladies). 
I drove from Bournemouth to Budapest with my Austrian GF in 1980 in an MGB V8 GT. Nice drive except for folks shaking fists at us in Hungary,maybe because we were doing 60 overtaking the struggling Ladas and other weird contraptions.
The "assigned" hotel was awful, the staff surly and food yucky -- but that was Communism. Elsewhere, very interesting. Got cheated by three men on the Lion Bridge exchanging money (the police policy seemed to be to arrest the tourist not the crooks). Czardas music in another hotel was wonderful, but the band knocked off at 10pm - we though it was for a break but they didn't come back. Budapest seemed to shut down around this hour, but probably we didn't know the right places. After 3 days we decided to call it quits and went back to Vienna.
Our last experience was two soldiers with tommy-guns leaping into the road in front of us when nearing the Austrian border, then a thorough search of our 2-seater for hidden stowaways. Still, it was all fun in retrospect !

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## Neo

Cheers Jim and welcome to the forum. Interesting tale.. nothing so eventful for us, just an Easyjet flight from Luton 
 :Very Happy:

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## nigelandjan

Good story Jim ,, imagine fuelling that V8 now all that way !

 Cant be related to our other member in Bournmouth as he hasn't mentioned ,, you know what  :Smile:

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## Neo

A lot of interesting architecture, though I don't know enough about any of it, I took lot's of pictures of various buildings, but I'll spare you. Suffice to say they're better viewed for yourself. 

There was fighting here between the occupying Germans and the Russians toward the end of the war, but the damage to the city centre was limited. 



There's also lot's of leftover traces of the Communist era, here a billboard atop a building without it's neon. 



On top of the Gellert Hill. 







Inside the Citadel fort. The 360 views are breathtaking. 
There is some history exhibitions here and also a small hotel.



Ze Bunker. A low budget history of the German occupation and Soviet battle against them, actually quite good with a lot of interesting photo's, the hilltop was the scene of intense fighting and was totally leveled under bombardment. 







Note the large river cruisers, very well equipped with cabins, restaurants etc.

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## Neo

A small part of Buda Castle











The easy way to the top.



Chain Bridge.

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## Neo

Parliament.

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## Neo

The sun sets..



and the lights come on. 





























That's all folks!  :Wink:

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## nigelandjan

Cheers Rob fantastic pics once again ,, can't wait to get me hands on me new GX1 , bloody things got a 10 day wait on it now , never mind the weather is still crap , and were gonna have a day out in Dublin when the weather breaks so , I hope to give it a christening then  :Smile: ,, shall be looking forward to yours and Bluey's expert eyes giving them a going over when I put em up.

  Out of green pixels am afraid ,, looking forward to your next photographic venture !

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## blue

ha ha 
there's nothing expert about my eyes 
{you can tell a Yorkshireman , but you cannot tell him much }
they can be a bit  critical though , but i do apply it  to my own  photos,
 worse in fact 


neo
if that's you  in the bunker photo reflection,
it's criminal the way you hold your camera,  single handed up in the air at arms length...
like a orchestra conductor.
i had a sneaky look at the photo info ,
see you have a Panasonic
 it's a good job too ,they seem to have the best  stabilization system !

anyway love the Elizabeth Taylor photo

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## Mathos

Neo, nice thread.

Well presented, exceptionally good photographs.

Hungary, certainly looks the part, some of the buildings 
you have shown especially are superb.


Parliament building looks very special. The River Bridge as well.

The bronze statues, and of course the Château.

Brilliant job all round, thanks for sharing.

Nice work Green coming your way.

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## Mathos

Sorry, It won't let me Green you.

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## Neo

> Cheers Rob fantastic pics once again ,, can't wait to get me hands on me new GX1 ,, shall be looking forward to yours and Bluey's expert eyes giving them a going over when I put em up.


Look closely at many of my pics and you can easily see the limits of the camera's ability..
the GX1 should adequatley cover all bases, but yes I'll happily offer any constructive opinion. 




> neo
> i had a sneaky look at the photo info ,
> see you have a Panasonic
> it's a good job too ,they seem to have the best stabilization system !
> 
> anyway love the Elizabeth Taylor photo


Lumix TZ6  :Wink:  Yes the Liz Taylor pic was very eye catching, it was in a interior design shop.. didn't have a price.. I was thinking of knocking up a few and knocking 'em out on the market.  :Smile: 




> Sorry, It won't let me Green you.


It's the thought that counts, I'm glad you enjoyed the pics.

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## Neo

I forgot this one..



 :Wink:

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## LanOks

Hi everybody

I'm looking for info about this statue of a girl on the roof of Ibis hotel. I was in Budapest in 2008 and was told this monument is in memory of those commited suicide 'cos Budapest had somewhat higher level of it compared to the rest of Europe. Now a friend asked me about it and im not sure what to say. Spent all day yesterday looking but nothing i can be sure of. Maybe there is some info in the hotel guest book or you could redirect me to some website i could read about it... Thank you!

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## Neo

> Hi everybody
> 
> I'm looking for info about this statue of a girl on the roof of Ibis hotel. I was in Budapest in 2008 and was told this monument is in memory of those commited suicide 'cos Budapest had somewhat higher level of it compared to the rest of Europe. Now a friend asked me about it and im not sure what to say. Spent all day yesterday looking but nothing i can be sure of. Maybe there is some info in the hotel guest book or you could redirect me to some website i could read about it... Thank you!


This one...



I thought it quite odd, but didn't realise it had any real significance. 
Please let us know if you find out more.

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## LanOks

Have already spent 2 days looking for info about it - there is number of facts but i can not put this puzzle pieces together.

1. The hotel is Ibis now but it was built in 1990 by a famous Hungarian architect Jozsef Finta and had a name Liget Hotel then (Liget means grove) but it doesnt say if he is the author of the statue. The hotel was renovated in 2000 and maybe it was then that they put the statue. I checked out a few statues by Finta - e.g. Shakespeare (sorry i can not give a link yet as i dont have enough posts) but it seems very different in style from that girl.
2. I started to dig into this suicide subject. There are studies saying the rate of suicides is really high in Hungary esp. with women. There is a song Gloomy Sunday that is often called Hungarian suicide song - the story is in Wiki. Still it has nothing to do with the place.
3. The movie Gloomy Sunday - Ein Lied Von Liebe und Tod (A Song of Love and Death) was filmed in 1999 and is a fantasy about how the song was made. Accoring to the list of filming locations on imdb.com the hotel or its restaurant was not one of the Hungarian locations for the movie. So this seems to be another dead end ((

I'm lost but starting to get obsessed with this puzzle. Need help! ))

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## Neo

Well I don't know if LanOks will come back to this thread, but I've found out that the piece is called "soaring bronze siren"  by Istvan Madarassy. It was built in 1990 and apparently has no particular significance to the location it is on. Just a piece of rather melancholy art.

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## beerlaodrinker

Thanks for taking the time neo, nice pics, ive heard good reports about hungary, The women would  allegedly give a jellyfish a woody

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## Neo

As far as cities go, Budapest is right up there with the must see destinations. In my opinion.  :Yup:  
Hungary is a big country and most of it is rural, very similar to France with long hot summers, the culture too is very food/family/village based. I'll be getting to see as lot more of it when I move in a couple of years.

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## natalie8

> the culture too is very food/family/village based.


How IS the food? Besides goulash, what are some traditional dishes?

Interesting story on the sculpture dedicated to suicide victims.

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## Neo

Very tasty, usually several courses. Always a soup.. lentils, peas etc.. lots of meat and potato, cabbage. The food is spicy, lot's of paprika, pepper and chillis. Pork is the mainstay, salami and chorizo, smoked belly pork...Lots of pickled vegetables, to substitute seasonal veg I guess, gherkins, onions, peppers. Hungary is very rural and the food reflects that, it's not complicated, but it is very tasty because of the seasoning. töltött káposzta is typical, it's cabbage stuffed with pork cooked with paprika  and served with sour cream, something like this would be part of a meal consisting of several dishes.

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## Dillinger

> How IS the food?


A typical Hungarian eats a pound of lard a week

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## Dillinger

> The women would allegedly give a jellyfish a woody


They are a miserable bunch though, their position at the top of World suicide figures testifies to that

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## tonyroma

hungarian women r hot ....lots of zsa zsa gabor types ...got too have the best racks in europe

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## t.s

> excellent pics, very good composition. 
> I haven't been to Budapest yet,, Thanks.


agreed, you have a great eye. green

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## socal

> Good pics, Neo. I only went to Budapest once, but I really enjoyed it. I'd post some pics, but they're mostly of my g/f at that time, a Romanian model with large breasts. I don't want the thread to go off track, so I'll await permission, or not, from the OP.


I have Budapest pics too. 

No Romaniain LB with me though...

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## Rainfall

I have always argued that Eastern Europe is a better tourist destination than the West. Fewer people, more space, cleaner air, more sereneness. Hungary is not even exceptional, Budapest is beautiful and so is Lake Balaton, but the rest of the nation is flat as a pancake and quite arid. CZ is great, Prague better than Budapest, and there are the wonderful small spas Karlsbad, Marienbad, Franzensbad. Best cuisine in the world, and great beers to wash it down. If more potent booze is desired, CZ is the home of Absynths banned anywhere else in the world. Croatia has the most beautiful scenery, beats even the Alps. Speaking about mountains, the High Tatry in Slovakia, Carpathians in Romania, and several alpine ranges in Bulgaria are as amazing as the Dolomites, and half as expensive to visit. The crown belongs to the Eastern shore of the Black Sea however, Russia and Georgia. The temperature in the summer is just right, you neither sweat nor freeze in the air and sea, and above it are the snowcapped peaks of the Caucasus. That's a blessed place. Wait for Sotchi and see for yourself.

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## Neo

So you don't like Hungary, you don't think Budapest is special and there are other places you've been that you think are much better... jeez who invited the black cloud along..?
So let's see your picture threads then...  ::chitown::

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