Wander More Work Less

Morning Walk  Our days are starting to follow a familiar trend: a good morning walk to see the sights, followed by lunch and a relaxed afternoon. It’s suiting us well so far, and it's similar to the approach we took in Cambodia and Thailand. You could spend all day out and cram six days into three, but that’s not what this lifestyle is all about. We could also be using the underground metro system here to avoid the walking, but then you don’t see as much. This morning, we headed to the Budapest Central Market via the Jewish Quarter and the Budapest Museum. The Central Market is a very large and beautiful building filled with street stalls. The main level is mostly meats, fruit, and veges, but also has some clothes, bags, and other items. One level up are touristy trinket-type shops—reasonably good quality, though not cheap—along with some tasty-looking food stalls. If it had been lunchtime, we would have been tempted, but it was only 9am! Below ground, there’s an Aldi supermarket, ...

We planned a big walk up to Buda Castle today, so we got up early at 6:30 a.m. to avoid the warmest part of the day—it’s supposed to reach 27 degrees later. There’s a funicular railway heading up the hill, but we were too early—and too frugal—for that. Taking the steps was our preferred option. That got the heart and lungs pumping, but the hill wasn’t too big. We were soon at the top, enjoying the view back over to Pest. We also had our first close-up view of the castle. It’s an impressive building. They certainly know how to build beautiful things in Hungary. We wandered along, down, and up again before finding our way into the inner courtyard, which was great to see. It’s hard to describe the building, but we took a few pictures that will hopefully do it justice. Eventually, we made our way back down some new steps to street and river level and set off for the bridge in the distance. It looked a long way off, but given it was only 9...

Another early start for me, but 6 a.m. felt reasonable compared with last week. I did some reading until Sarah woke up, and then after breakfast, we set off on our morning walk. Our first stop was St. Stephen’s Basilica—an absolutely massive and beautiful church that was built between 1851 and 1906. At its highest point, it's 96 metres tall! From there, it was only a short walk to the Danube near the Chain Bridge. Some interesting information about the bridge is shown below. We walked across the bridge to the Buda side of Budapest. There were great views from the bridge of Buda Castle and the other prominent buildings lining the river on both sides. We could also see the funicular railway heading up the hill beside the castle. The castle will wait for us to explore another day. We retraced our steps back across the bridge and then walked along the river. It didn’t take long to reach the bronze shoes on the Danube—a moving ...

A late start to the morning after being up late last night. I managed to snooze and/or sleep through until 8 a.m. Wow! The one-hour time zone difference helped with that. Our first priority was to find breakfast. We discovered a Spar store very close by, which was good enough for the breakfast supplies shown below. 

Awake at 3 am but managed to get back to sleep and stayed that way until 5 am, which was great. I had breakfast and did some reading to pass the time this morning. We don’t need to depart until midday. We did one last walk around the block into Pitshanger to take a few photos of the nicer houses in the area. Not sure if I mentioned this earlier, but this has been an ideal, safe, and quiet area for our stay. Before I forget, the biggest pain about the flat was the three levels of stairs. You don’t get very far before going up or down again because you realise you left something on another floor. This wasn’t helped by the fact it took us days to discover that the hallway cupboard was actually another toilet—so we didn’t need to go all the way up to level three every time! 😂 We set off on foot to Ealing Broadway station one last time. Our preferred Elizabeth line train was cancelled! Plan B was the Central line, which is hotter and not as pleasant, but at least it was running...

Far out!!! 3am!!! Awake and trying to get back to sleep. By 4am, I was reading my book. It’s going to be a very long day. ☹️ At 5am, I had breakfast, and just after 6am, Sarah joined me. For our last full day here, we planned to head back into the city and tick off a couple more walking tour sights. We kicked things off with Piccadilly Circus, which was completely underwhelming. In my mind, it was supposed to be a giant roundabout with lots of traffic, but it turns out it’s just a shopping area. Famous for what? I still have no idea. 😂 I should mention how the Aaron and Sarah travel team is operating on this trip so far. Sarah has been in charge of finding accommodation (with a little support from me) and also marks out the main sights to visit on the map. She’s also the final decision-maker on whether something is worth spending entrance fee money on. My main jobs are logistics and navigation — working out how we get from place to place and organising transport. I’m also chief naviga...

I normally avoid drugs like the plague, but sometimes they just make sense—so I took a sleeping pill last night. I woke at 4 a.m. but soon fell back asleep until just before 6 a.m., which was great. Hopefully, that was enough to reset the body clock. I’ll find out tonight. After a long trip and a few busy days, it was good to just chill out and not do much today. We washed our grubby clothes in the machine under the kitchen bench. No, not the dishwasher! Their washing machines are under the kitchen bench here in England. While we waited for the wash to cycle through, Sarah was busy downloading more e-books while I edited a video. We hung the washing on a clothes rack outside to dry—there was no sign of a clothesline or a dryer. We then went for a walk to explore the local area a bit more, including Pitshanger Park. It was very large and well used on a sunny Sunday—people walking dogs, playing golf and tennis, or just out walking like we were. It was interesting to see a lar...