We spent most of our time in Budapest on the Pest side but took a taxi to the Buda side to see Matthias Church and the Fisherman’s Bastion. Matthias Church, officially known as the Church of Our Lady or the Church of the Assumption of the Buda Castle, is a Roman Catholic church located in the Holy Trinity Square in front of the Fisherman’s Bastion. The church was originally built in 1255. It has been called Matthias Church (referring to…
We walked down Andrássy Avenue, a boulevard dating back to 1872. It is lined with expensive stores and old mansions, many of which are now embassies. Andrássy Avenue is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The first two pictures below show statues that have graced these buildings for many years and now welcome shoppers. The first statue is outside Gucci’s and the second is outside a luxury watch shop. Next is the Hungarian State Opera House. It opened in 1884 and…
It probably seems that the Shoes on the Danube Promenade and the Hungarian Parliament are two very dissimilar topics to include in the same post. I did so because the memorial is just south and across the street from the Parliament building. It would be easy to see them both on the same morning or afternoon. The Shoes on the Danube Promenade is a tribute to the 20,000 Jewish people who died here at the hands of the Arrow Cross,…
The Dohány Street Synagogue, also known as the Great Synagogue, is the largest synagogue in Europe and the second largest in world. It is actually a complex consisting of the Great Synagogue, the Jewish Museum, Heroes’ Temple, a graveyard, and the Raoul Wallenberg Emlékpark, also known the Holocaust Memorial Park. We visited all of these, but I will start by describing the Great Synagogue. After the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem, synagogues became a center of Jewish religious life. A…
St. Stephen’s Basilica is named in honor of Stephen, the first king of Hungary (975-1038). The site itself has an interesting history A theatre – famous for its animal fights – stood in the place of the basilica in the 18th century. Before construction of the church, an enormous flood ravaged the city in 1838, which came to be known as the large flood of Budapest. The square on which the building now stands rose up from the flat plain of…
After arriving in Budapest, we disembarked from the MS Joy. We spent several days in Budapest – it was one of our favorite cities. In future posts, I will focus on some of the wonderful places we visited. But in this post, I want to share some of what we found as we took walks in the city. I will start with the picture above the blog title. It is street art that was near our hotel. The statue below,…
After leaving Vienna, we sailed to Bratislava, Slovakia. Originally known as Pressburg, it was annexed by Hungary in the 11th Century and served as the capital of Hungary for nearly 250 years. In 1919, the city was annexed to the Czechoslovak Republic and at that time its name was changed to Bratislava. The Nazis and then the Soviets controlled Bratislava until 1989. With the split of Czechoslovakia into two nations in 1993, Slovakia became an independent state with Bratislava as…
On our second day in Vienna, we toured the Schönbrunn Palace. Together with the Hofburg, the Schönbrunn Palace is the other major palace in Vienna. The Schönbrunn Palace and its associated buildings, gardens, fountains and statues are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The Schönbrunn’s history extends back to Middle Ages. In 1569, Maximilian II acquired it for the Habsburg Dynasty. Emperor Matthias used it for hunting and, while hunting, discovered a “fair spring” which in German is translated “schoner brunnnen”…
Our next port of call was Vienna, where we would spend two days. Vienna is the capital and largest city in Austria. It has been inhabited since 500BC when the Celts first settled here. The historic City Centre was placed on the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in 2001. Vienna, situated on the Danube River in the eastern part of Austria, developed from early Celtic and Roman settlements into a medieval and Baroque city, eventually becoming the capital of…
After touring the Cesky Krumlov Palace, we made our way back to Linz and then departed for Dürnstein in the Wachau Valley early the next morning. Brunch was served on the riverboat so we could make our way to the sun deck in the early afternoon to enjoy the beautiful sites. The Wachau Valley is considered one of the most beautiful parts of the Danube and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, both for its architectural and agricultural history. It…