Budapest, Hungary: Two Cities are Twice as Nice

We spent the day today in Hungary's capital city, Budapest.  Unbeknownst to me, Budapest is actually the combination of two cities: Buda on the west side of the Danube (in the foreground of the picture above), and Pest on the east side of the Danube (in the background--the big white building is Parliament).  Hence, the capital's name: Budapest.

I climbed to the top of Castle Hill in Buda to check out the Royal Palace, which looks very much as you would expect a couple-hundred year old palace to look.  The view of Pest from the top is amazing, though, which makes it well-worth the climb!  The tall towers in the picture above belong to St. Stephan's Basilica (the patron saint of Hungary), and the bridge is called the Bridge of Chains.  I walked to Pest over this bridge, which was nice--because I was in the middle of the Danube, it was the one time all day I was not hot!

This is Hero's Square in Pest, which was erected in 1896 to commemorate the 1000th anniversary of the victory of the Magyars over the Carpathians.  It was very large and filled with scary-looking statuary, but a nice tribute, just the same.

The view of the Danube from the Fisherman's Bastion, which is at the other end of Castle Hill from the Royal Palace.  I climbed the towers, which were in surprisingly good repair in comparison to the rest of the city.

Matthias Church, which is in the same plaza as Fisherman's Bastion, has an absolutely gorgeous roof!  The shadows were getting long at this point, so you can't really see me, but the church is much more interesting anyway :-)