The Great Danube Cruise, Final Day - Budapest
Today is the last say of the trip and I am exhausted.
I really blew a gasket. While the ride in was truly awe inspiring, a day of
touring was not looking exciting. But we did it!
The morning
tour was an overview of Budapest. It is a glorious city and learning the
history is such a draw. I loved hearing more about Sisi and how much she loved
the city and how she and Franz Joseph helped bring Budapest to the next level
in the cultural language of the era. The opera house, the Parliament building,
the grand boulevards.
It truly is the Paris of the East. Sadly, 50 years of
Russians and communism has faded it’s glory and it will take many years for
some of those decadent buildings to be revived.
This is a coffee cup designed for mustaches...
Again we went to lunch on the boat and again we had
another tour at 2. It was The Gold and Glory tour and indeed we saw some
wonderful buildings, an Art Nouveau museum and a coffee shop that had been
restored to its former 1910 glory. The Russians had painted over all the
frescos and gilding but it was fully restored only 10 years ago.
After that we toured the Opera house. It was lovely
but I had had it. Mom could tell and nudged me to see if that cab outside would
accept Euros. It did, I waved goodbye and headed to the place I was waiting to
go to all day, Gellert spa!
The Gellert hotel is where Wes Anderson stayed and
inspired The Grand Budapest Hotel. It is quite a remarkable building and we
were docked across the river from it and every person who has visited Budapest
told me it was a must to visit the baths. It was 5pm and it closed at 8 so I
knew I didn’t have long. I asked for an all access pass and found a locker,
changed and started my tour. I found the outside pool filled with young people
and a little broke down sauna box next to it. I stepped in and let the relaxing
begin. I spent about 10 minutes in there before daring the copper ice plunge
pool. DAMN that was cold, damn it felt good.
I continued to explore. There was room after room of
tiled beauty. Oh how I wished for my one-piece bathing suit, a Victrola and all
of my friends. The big bathing hall was beautiful with its big dragonheads
spewing warm water and the bronze statue of a young naked girl holding a turtle
smiled down on the pool. But I really loved the double thermal bath room with
matching fountains on either side with grotesques spurting hot, hot sulfur
water down into the pools. Their mouths deformed by the thick ripples of the sulfur
hardened as it dribbled down. I sat in the pool in total ecstasy, gazing at the
tiles and the tall ceilings. Sitting next to me was a cute British couple who
were creating stories about everyone in the pool. I just sat and listened. It
was hysterical.
Sadly it was time to wrap it up. I had plunged and
steamed and plunged and swam for nearly two hours. It was nirvana. But I wanted
to be back for the final dinner with the clan. Wet and relaxed I walked back
over the Franz Joseph bridge as the sun set over the Danube.
And as I walked
down the gangplank I saw some of our friends, waving me in for dinner. It was
the perfect ending of a whirlwind tour of a glorious part of the world. I would
love to come back and just be, be in Vienna drinking coffee, hike those
mountains and sleep late!
Thank you mama for another magical mystery tour.
