Helga's European Odyssey.

Budapest 2.

OK. So Johan Strauss jun. definitely got it wrong. The Danube is not blue!!!! As a secondary school pupil I gazed out the window and wondered how magical it would be to sail on a blue river.

So, its not blue, but as much as we’ve seen it is magical. The history of the river, the buildings, the people, the whole shebang. I loved every minute of seeing it. We had the Moselle, my favourite at the time, the Rhine, never saw much of it so far on this trip, and now the Danube, wow. Every boyhood dream put to rest. Not blue, not as dirty as the Thames, not as clean as the Lagan, but big, very big. In Budapest it is up to 53 meters wide, which is nowhere near as wide as in Bratislava or elsewhere. It is around 6-7 meters deep going through Budapest with one particularly deep spot of 15 meters close to the Pest side! I’m a sucker for details, and boy this city of two halves, Buda and Pest is full of them.

Anyway, the city. Citizens of the EU get well looked after here, in a way that possibly harks back to Communist days, or possibly just being the ethos of belonging to a large group. Senior citizens get free public transport, government run museums and exhibition centres give huge discounts on entrance. The city has the second, only to the Northern Line in London, underground, eldest underground train line in the world. Artificial intelligence, first discovered here early last century. Helicopter, first invented here around 1916, computers, first dreamt up here years and years ago. The list is long.

These sausages are very popular

The parliament and one of the many "Guards".

Hungarians like many others, love to speak English, if they’re good at it. If they aren’t they can and often are the most brusque people we’ve met so far.

Shop, and café staff are downright belligerent, but ask someone for directions, and they nearly tell you their life story!