And here it is, the last day of our whirlwind Spring Break tour. By this point, we were exhausted. Happy, loving life, but exhausted. Our feet had walked miles and miles of European streets and cobblestone. We'd climbed hills, navigated public transported, relocated, lived in a limited wardrobe for 10 days, survived a Czech Hospital, partied with old friends and new.
And yet, I woke up early, ready to seize our last day. We got ready, had breakfast, bid farewell to Corey and Melody, and checked out. We left our luggage at the hostel and headed out. Since Stacy had missed the grand tour we decided we'd take a walk around Budapest and show her the finer aspects with a little repeated Gabor humor. It turned out to be a good day to explore. The national holiday had brought everyone out on the streets, adorned in pins of Hungarian flag colors. The streets were hopping. Street vendors lined the river. Flags were everywhere. It was in celebration of the Anniversary of the 1848 Revolution.
We crossed the Chain Bridge to give Stacy a view of Pest from Buda. There were all sorts of horse and carriages out and about and tons of kids dressed in snow suits. We crossed back on the bridge, walking down the middle of the bridge. The wind was blowing again and the flags were waving. Children playing. Just a happy day in Budapest.
We headed back towards St. Stephen's and did a little souvenir shopping. Jen had plans to meet up with a friend from high school in Med school in Budapest so we left her at the coffee shop and hiked towards the Hungarian Bath. Now for those of you have heard about my Turkish Bath experience, I was hoping that the Budapest Bath would be nothing like this. But from the pictures we saw and what we read, this was more swimming pool less naked Turkish women.
As we walked to the bath, we heard music blasting. "Praise You" by Fatboy Slim blasting over the loud speakers as we walked by the St. Stephens. Me and Laura started to dance as we walked. Singing and dancing, we crossed the empty street that had be closed for the celebrations. I can't really put into words the moment, the moment were you can just dance. Because. Dancing in empty Budapest streets. I preemptively peaked that moment as a highlight of the day and the trip.
It was a bit of stroll down the Pest streets but it was a sunny day and I love a good walk. We arrived in the park and there were more celebration going on. A group of people standing in a circle holding hands singing. The park was perfect. There were pretzel stands, unique bridges, castles. We saw a big yellow building that I thought was the bath so I went inside and asked. Yep, right place. After asking an english speaker a few questions we got general admission wrist bands and headed into the locker rooms to change. We got a locker card and a hanger and we changed into our bathing suits. (Bathing suits=step up from naked europeans).
Once changed, we tried to figure out this place without looking too touristy. We walked through the bath room that was full of men. We were worried we had gone in the wrong place but we saw a woman and felt better. It smelled a little gross in that room so we found the door to go outside. While freezing outside, the pools out there seemed a little more what we were up to. The minute we got outside in our towels we ran to the nearest bench, tossed our towels and ran in our swim suits to the warm water.
The water was about 37 degrees celsius which is about 98.6 fahrenheit. It felt amazing. We just floated around in the warm water, enjoying the sun. Old men were playing chess as they sat in the water. The hot water hitting the cold air caused steam. We soaked for a bit, our bodies worn out from all the go-go-go. After a bit, we decided to explore the other pools. One was cold, no thank you. We kept running. It was cold outside. Probably like 40. We ended up in a warm pool. This pool had like a wave circle. You float around in a circle with the current pulling you. The closer you get to the wall the faster you go as the jets push you. We had a great time just flying around, trying not to crash into one another.
Then there was the bubble waters. We stood in the bubble areas for a bit soaking up the sun and relaxing. The water was like less than hot so we decided to move back to the hot pool. We ran, freezing, back to the hot pool. We were all loving it. Very European, relaxing. The pool was surrounded by the beautiful building. As we were just sitting chilling, we recognized a little shrimp running towards us. JEN! She had come to join us. Stevie gave her a piggy back ride around the pool. By this time, we were getting a little pruney. We soaked for few minutes more...enjoying the sun, water, and each other company's. It felt like real spring break. Laura was loving on the water. Missing all things Australian.
We got out of the pools, ran inside, and showered, changed, and tried to beautify. We met up at the metro station and tried to head to this Italian restaurant Jen had gone to with her friend. We couldn't find it so we walked back to near the hostel. We were in a hurry so we found a different italian restaurant called Pizza Marzano. Laura and I split an American Pizza and I had a piece of Claire's which she told me later had Goat Cheese on it. Claire ended up buying us all lunch since the woman wouldn't split our checks for us. Thanks Claire :) Somewhere on our walk home, Stevie responded to something "It's your world squirrel". I looked at her, and was like, what is that from? And she's like "Fresh Prince". After all the years of not knowing, I finally figured out where Brent got that phrase. A weird highlight but it's one of my favorite phrases.
We hustled back to the Hostel to catch our 4:30 shuttle to the airport. Door to door service for like 7 euro. Not too shabby in my book. A mini-bus picked us up and took us right there. We had allotted plenty of time to check in. Good thing. The check in system (the counter) was having technical difficulties. We ended up waiting in line for an hour just to check in. It was a mob of madness but after checking my luggage weight (9.2 kgs) and going through passport control and security we were at the gate with 30 mins to spare.
We got some snacks and did pits and peaks of the whole trip. We all agreed that we had geniunely enjoyed each other company which was wonderful since we are all different and stuck together for 10 days straight. We had promised each other at the beginning that we couldn't get annoyed with each other until day 7. I can honestly say I don't think we ever really got annoyed with one another. My highlight of the trip was just the random times we broke into song or dance or laughed uncontrollably. We loved Berlin's history, Prague's charm, Vienna's familiar faces, and Budapest's character.
Just as we were about to line up to board our flight was delayed 30 mins. Turns out Manchester airspace had been closed due to a broken radar so they had to redirect our flight and add more fuel. Well better safe than sorry. I ended up sitting next to Jenbo on the flight and we slept on each other's shoulders for most of the flight.
Arrival in Dublin airport and back to our rooms as quickly as possible. The Aircoach was busy with tourists in town for St. Patrick's Day. We bid farewell and went to our respective rooms and apartments. Exhaustion but what a good trip. Seriously one of the best weeks of my life. Saw so much, learned so much, laughed so much.
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