Budapest, Hungary - Part II

I wanted to get some pictures posted of the things we saw as we explored around the Castle District. The architecture was beautiful, and very diverse. It was explained to us that when something had to be rebuilt (or reconstructed as they say it), it was always rebuilt in the favorite style of the time. It was not until a short while ago (last 100 years or so) that Hungary determined the older buildings should be rebuilt with keeping history in mind. You will see many buildings now that were originally build in the 1500s or 1600s, rebuilt in the 1800s in a different style, and now being rebuilt to reflect the original style.

Most all buildings are stone or concrete, many with huge wooden doors. The roads are brick, stone or cobblestone - at least in the castle district. Once you get into the city proper, the roads are paved.



Our first morning there we slept passed breakfast time in the hotel and had to go wandering to find a place to eat. We came across a little cafe inside a bookstore. Under the glass of the tables, people left notes. Pooh left his own, so if you are ever in Budapest, look it up.



We went to a quaint little cafe for lunch the first day we were there. When going to the rest room, they call it a water closet over there, we stumbled upon this area of the restaurant. (Can you see Pooh sitting down there on the table?)



As the week went on, we realized that most of the buildings in the Castle District of Budapest had these hidden lower levels. The entire hill is criss-crossed with underground caves. This is from the Budapest Sun:

During the middle ages, the existing caverns, formed by the thermal water, were linked up by man-made passages. The population of Castle Hill had started to expand after the Mongol invasion of 1242. King Béla IV ordered the building of the Buda Castle. In Medieval Buda, 300 houses had 285 wells fed by "cave water". King Béla IV chose the hill, partly because of its strategic location, and because its wells and caves provided water and protection for castle dwellers even in times of battle.

The inhabitants of the medieval castle region probably chanced upon the caves hidden in the depths of the hill while digging wells, even before the castle was built, as exploration work has revealed cave development from as early as the 11th century. It is possible that the arrangement of houses on the surface was laid out according to the cave cellars below.

Fables tell of secret tunnels and covert military actions. One legend has it that during King Mátyás's rule in the 15th century there was a tunnel used as an escape route that led to Margitsziget. Engineers poured cold water on this theory, saying it would have been discovered when digging the tunnel for the second metro. However, one tunnel, leading all the way to Budatétény, 22km away, has been explored. The existence of another supposed tunnel to Visegrád, 40km north, has not been proved. Rock cellars, partly filled with silt, were discovered during the reconstruction of the medieval Church of Our Lady (Mátyás templom) in the 1870s. The Civil Engineering Authority commissioned Ignác Schubert to survey all the cavities. Schubert made the first survey of the underground city in 1882, discovering 120 rock cellars in an area from Szent György tér as far as Bécsi kapu.

(King Mátyás is King Matthias) There are tours you can take which will take you through some of the caves. The tours are not recommended for people with claustrophobia so we passed. :-)

This is a picture of Pooh with a friend Jay at lunch that day. In the picture you can the painted walls. Most restaurants we went into had beautifully painted walls.

Outside the restaurant, we came across a scooter. Pooh was fascinated with it so the owner allowed him to check it out.



Pooh was also fascinated by their phone booths.



I do not remember who this statue is, but thought it was pretty cool. I will try to find out and update the post.


To close this post, here are a few tidbits of Hungary:

Hungary has long stood at the forefront of science, technology and pop culture.

Erno Rubik - inventor of Rubik's cube
John Von Neumann - Father of Binary Code (ok, so this may only be thrilling to me)
Peter Carl Goldmark - invented the color television
Zsa Zsa Gabor and her sisters
Charles Fleischmann - yeast
Bela Lugosi - actor
Eugene Tudor - writes travel guides
First underground railway in Europe
The greatest magician of all time Erich Weiss
One of the founders of punk rock Thomas Erdelyi

Hungary is also known for Paprika. It can be found in almost all the food in restaurants. It is also on the table as a condiment as we would have salt and pepper on ours.

My next post will be our venturing into the Pest side, including the oldest market place in Europe.