Hungary: Budapest

An Italian town close to the border with Austria

After two days of driving we finally got to our first real stop……..Budapest, the capital of Hungary. We were absolutely tired but the city was a fantastic surprise…..in my opinion it is one of the most beautiful in Europe although it is one of the smallest. Hungary has a population of 10 million and 2 million live in the capital. The country is very well organised if compared to the other eastern European countries and the people are very polite but also very reserved. As all the other countries in Eastern Europe it has lived under the shadow of the Soviet Union until 1948 when after the War of Independence Hungary was claimed an independent country.  We arrived in the evening and our friend Agnes took us to eat a fantastic Goulash a stew made of beef, red onions, vegetables, spices and plenty of paprika and to top the evening she then took us in the Citadella to view the city by night.

The day after we venture into the capital and we did our own tour of the city, visiting first the castle, a Unesco sight and certainly one of the biggest I have ever seen. After a two hour long stroll we crossed the Danube, the famous river that divides the city of Buda from the one of Pest that together form the capital but also the river that inspired musicians like Mozart and the like. The view of the Parliament ( the biggest in Europe) is breathtaking and only the roaming cars disturb this incredible panorama.

 

Mathias Church in the CastleThe Royal Palace in the castle

We then had lunch in one of the millions restaurants you can find along Andrassy Street and we sipped our first and well deserved Hungarian beer. We ended our day walking to Heroes Square where there are all the sculptures of people of great importance in Hungary and I have to admit that if we had time we would have certainly bathed in one of the natural therapeutic baths in offer. In fact Budapest has 100 thermal springs where about 80 million litres of water rise to the surface every day!!!!

Unluckily we will have to leave instead and be in the car for the next two days so that we can reach Turkey as soon as possible. The car is going well and we are loving every single minute of it.

The beginning……of an adventure

Mongol Rally Route

Although we are not leaving until the 18^th of July the adventure has already started for us. We have been applying for visas and it has been taking us ages because we did not expect we had to plan the all trip there and then. We have never really thought before about how far we have to go and how many countries, people, cultures, religions, foods, roads,adventures, habits, obstacles, challenges we will live in the 10000 miles we are going to travel.

There were so many more places we wanted to go to but the visa cost would become too high. I suppose the fact we have to reach Mongolia by the 14th of October did not help either.

So here is the route…..we leave from Italy the 18th of July, we are passing through Austria and into Hungary where we hope to visit at least Budapest. We then go into the land of Dracula and cross the border into Bulgaria, with its monasteries, sky resorts, old tombs and natural parks. Once we reach Turkey we will definitely be out of Europe and in the hands of God or better Allah.

Turkey with its Roman ruins and Turkish baths, with the beautiful Cappadocia and the fantastic Istanbul. After we have gone across the all length of the country we then will move into Iran and it better be good because it cost us the beauty of 145 £ each to get a visa. By the way I will have to wear the Hejab (because I am a woman) for the entire time we are there and believe it or not, I even had to wear it when taking a photo for my visa, having the photographer laughing at me because I did not know how to do it properly.

But going back to the trip…..Persia with the famous Persepolis so important in the past, the even more striking Isfahan and so far the second country in the world for gas and oil resources. A country that most people consider Arab but that in fact is so different in culture, religion, language and habits.

And then we get into Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan about which we know nothing about…….and the famous land of Borat, Kazakhstan. Russia is next, followed by Mongolia where there are only 80 km of sealed roads in the all country and only a look at the map will make you understand the difficulty involved. We will be able to tell more stories about these countries during the trip…..that is one of the reason we are going there….

Ulaanbaatar is the final target……(if we ever get there)….where we can go and visit the charity we are raising money for.

I will be writing soooooooooon…..

——peace—–:-) and a thought goes for all the Italians killed and hurt by the earthquake…

This Ball A

Mongol Rally Route