"Budapest - my number 2 favo ..." a Budapest Travel Page by johngayton

Flying from London Heathrow. As soon as I got on the plane I felt welcome. I flew with Malev and the cabin crew were excellent, the seats wide with plenty of legroom, the food ok (so far as airline food goes) and the great thing was that they passed the drinks trolley round three times. This gave me an opportunity to try Hungarian wine before I had even arrived. But more of Hungarian wine later.
After a very relaxing flight, a hassle free entry, no problems with luggage, I found the desk for the airport minibus, told them my hotel name and within ten minutes was on my way into the city. I assume other people have mentioned this, but I will reiterate - the airport minibus is the easiest way to get into the city and back to the airport. Arrival at the hotel, friendly welcome, efficient check in, comfortable, well appointed room - see my hotel comments.

Having arrived early evening, by the time I had unpacked etc it was about 8 pm. The evening was bright and warm and so I decided to take a wander. My hotel was next door to the Opera House, which is itself worth a visit, and only minutes from St Stephens Basilica which is a magnificient building, considering it has been destroyed on several occassions over the past few hundred years.

My walk took me across the magnificent Schenenyi Bridge, from which an old guy was in the middle of reeling in a decent looking fish - I think he said it was a catfish, but my Hungarian is virtually zero. Walking upriver on the Buda side the sun was setting over the hills behind me, casting a red glow onto the facades of the buildings on the other side, which include the parliament. Returning towards my hotel via the Elizabeth bridge and Nador utca, I dropped into the Tulipan Prezzso, which had been recommended by "Time Out", and had my first taste of Hungarian beer - in fact by the time I left it was about 2 am, pleasant bar, friendly service and the barmaid educated me in how to ask for a beer properly and introduced me to the joys of the salami szendvich (or however it is spelled).

I got back to the hotel pleasantly fatigued about 3 am and had a very good nights sleep.

If I am staying in a place for more than a few days I like to find a small bar, not too touristy, to use as my base. Somewhere that I can drop in at various times, perhaps for a coffee in the afternoon, a few beers in the evening, or perhaps a nightcap on the way back to my hotel. Usually after a few visits I get on first name terms with the staff and some of the regulars. Here in Budapest I found the Cafe Montmarte on Zrinyi utca, not far from my hotel. Being on the street leading from the basilica going towards the river it was obviously attempting to attract the tourist trade, but also has a small group of local regulars. This is a really comfortable small bar with live music every evening, most of which is provided by Slavik who is an excellent singer ( I think he is actually Russian ) and quite entertaining with it.

Having dropped in for a beer or two lateish on the Saturday night the bar owner Rami ( who at first appears a little bit slick, but is in fact a really nice guy ) told me that if I liked jazz I should come in earlier on the Sunday evening as he had a really good band appearing there. I thought "why not?" and duly dropped in about 9 pm. I was not dissapointed - not only is Myrtill (pictured) a superb singer she is also absolutely gorgeous and has a presence perfectly suited to the intimacy of such a small bar. With backing from a double bassist and a keyboard player she had us captivated with an eclectic set, mostly in English but with a few multilingual touches. Her site myrtill is well worth a visit and lists her upcoming gigs. (NB this site has a soundtrack, "Besame Mucho", and may take a little longer to download than normal)

Keeping briefly to the jazz theme - a visit to the Jazz Garden is also well worthwhile - the cover charge is about 600 forints, the beer is reasonably priced, the staff friendly and the the musicians excellent.

One of the highlights of my trip was the wine festival in The City Park, the picture is a scan from the festival programme.
It was a beautiful sunny day on the Saturday, having been preceeded by two days of torrential rain, and purely on the spur of the moment I decided to take the metro to City Park - the metro station Szechenyi furdo (on line1 for Mexikoi) is smack bang in the middle of the park. Coming up from the station I could hear music not too far away and naturally gravitated towards it.
Next thing I knew I was in the middle of all these people walking around with glasses of wine, an excellent folk band playing on a stage and various food stalls and barbeques. There were also about thirty little wooden huts doling out wine. It took me a couple of minutes to work out what was going on, but then I twigged that it was a wine festival on pretty much the same lines as our beer festivals. The system was exactly the same - you bought a glass and a sheaf of tickets and visited whatever stall took your fancy, exchanged the required number of tickets and got your glass filled.
I must admit to a liking for a drop of wine and I can honestly say that Hungarian wine is as good as any in the world. Particular wineries to look out for are Takler Pince and Bock Pince. The main wine growing region is Villanyi and the Bock Pince Villanyi Merlot, which I had several glasses of, was as good a drop of wine as I've tasted.
I spent the whole of Saturday afternoon there and returned again on the Sunday (purely to use up my leftover tickets!). The atmosphere was brilliant, it was more aimed at the locals than tourists and they were out to enjoy themselves. Even though I don't speak Hungarian a smile and a few gestures is enough to get by.
At one particular stall where I was doing my "point at a bottle, thumbs-up" routine, the girl serving said she could speak some English. I asked for a glass of red wine and she asked what type of red I liked - "I like a nice big red." I replied, and so she filled my glass right up to the brim!!

A small useful piece of information is that if you come across a wine labelled "Portuguiser" - this does not mean that it is from Portugal, but rather that it has been aged in old port casks. Most of the wineries produce at least one "Portuguiser" and all the ones I tried were more than drinkable.

Having spent a good five hours there - wine tasting is very tiring work - I decided I was in need of a little snooze! Fortunately the Metro station was nearby and from the Opera Metro stop to my hotel was only about 50 yards walk and so I didn't have to indulge in any hazardous activities such as trying to cross a road or navigate the side streets etc.