I know I said in my previous blog that I would be off the radar for a while blog-wise but I've got a bit of time on my hands for literally the first time in three weeks, so here I am!
It was fantastic, as always, to go home for Easter, although the weather was rubbish the entire week I was there! It's always a bit of a comfort for me to find that no matter how far away I go from home or how long I'm gone for, Edinburgh is still there and it's still essentially the same. I had fun revisiting places like Teviot and the Crags - it was all very nostalgic! Sophie came up to Edinburgh last Thursday so we could catch our plane to Bratislava on Friday and it was good to show her some of the more touristy spots of the city that I never feel like I can really visit because I live there!
As I said, we left Edinburgh on Friday afternoon, and by Saturday lunch time we were in Budapest - meaning we had set foot in four countries (five for Sophie since she started in England) in less than 24 hours - impressive stuff! Needless to say we didn't get more than a glimpse of Bratislava or Vienna before we jumped on a train to Hungary. I hadn't really known anything about Budapest before we arrived and was interested to discover that it was traditionally two cities - Buda and Pest - separated by the Danube which were then united. Buda is definitely the more picturesque of the two and has far more impressive buildings although Pest houses the parliament building which is absolutely gorgeous. Budapest is also 'the city of spas' (another fact I hadn't known before I arrived)as it sits on top of lots of thermal springs. The first day we were there we went along to some thermal baths in Buda, just next to St Gellert's hill which has a cave cut into the side of it which was turned into what has to be one of the most beautiful churches I've ever seen. The baths were just what we needed after a trek up the hill! The inside of building was beautiful with loads of mosaics and statues everywhere - it was obviously supposed to be a retreat for the wealthier citizens of the city, but because Hungary doesn't use the Euro it was so cheap that it was full of young tourists as well. I've decided that a spa holiday in Budapest is definitely on my to do list for future travels! While we were there we also did a boat trip on the Danube which had a stop off on on of the islands attached to the city which was really interesting and informative but also resulted in really awful sunburn! As always with these kinds of holidays - two days was just not enough time either to see everything we wanted to see or to truly get the feel of the city. It was also unfortunate that Budapest is in the middle of overhauling its entire transport system, including building new railway and tram lines so that the entire center of the city in both Buda and Pest resembled a massive construction site, which made getting good photos difficult! We went with it though and now have quite a few shots of ourselves posing in front of cranes and scaffolding!
When we got back to Vienna we were exhausted but I was also excited to see the city. I have to say that it has lived up to every expectation I could have had of it and I am more than a little bit jealous that Max gets to live here all the time! We've been filling our days with sightseeing and sunbathing and eating the best cake I have ever had in the most beautiful cafe's I have ever seen! Last week we went to the Volksoper, the smaller and less fancy of Vienna's opera houses, to see the Nutcracker. Although it was slightly unseasonal it was fantastic - I was completely mesmerised. We also got fantastic seats, only 4 rows from the front because they sell the students all the leftover tickets for ten euro just before the curtain goes up, which I think is a really inspired idea.
I'm starting to run out of time to write down everything we've been up to so I'll have to leave it until another time to tell you about everything we've done in Vienna and our trip to Prague which we got back from last night. I've loved this trip so much that I really think I'll have to do some proper backpacking after uni!
