Those are lovely pics of that gorgeous architecture, Anthony!

. 

Yes Anthony, your pics are excellent and your family looks thrilled to be visiting so many wonderful places. 

Out of curiosity, did your son get a key with those handcuffs? 

Cheers, Terry

What a pretty white castle.  I hope there's more photos to come.

Hero's Square in Pest. Each statue pays homage to a different Hungarian hero.

The hero of the country, King Stephen. He founded Hungary as a country in the 11th Century. He made the country Catholic as well, which is why he is also, St. Stephen.

Yes, Terry, he got two sets of keys to the cuffs.

Hungary had a similar experience as Poland.  It was overrun and occupied by Nazis in WWII, then was "liberated" by the Red Army and subject to 40 years of Communist rule, but with a twist.

The twist is that when the Soviets told the world that the Eastern European countries all became communist of their own free will and were not coerced by the Red Army to adopt that system, the Hungarians took the Soviets at their word.  In 1956, they declared Hungary a neutral country and withdrew from the Warsaw Pact.  The Red Army invaded the country, deposed and executed the Hungarian leadership and reinstated Soviet communist rule.  Bulletholes in buildings bear the scars of Hungary's tortured past:

Nevertheless, its beauty remains:

In the summer of  1977 (when I was 52) I took a partial Sabbatical and myself & my wife took a vacation away from our 3 kids the youngest of whom at the time was 18  - she was just a few months before the army (the older daughter & son had already finished their service !!)..

Budapest, like virtually all of the cities I visited, has an extraordinarily beautiful main catholic church: St. Stephen's Basilica.

Wow, the churches are AWESOME aren't they?  All that art, all that beauty.  I imagine it gave the congregation something to look at while sitting through Latin masses.   Having grown up Protestant and being used to a much starker church decor I find the over the top European churches leave me gawping.

And I just love all those tiny spires on that riverside cathedral.  The eastern architecture is so very different but they do the same stupid things to their treasures that we all do - build right next to them and ruin the visual impact.  I've become quite adept at photoshopping road signs out of photos now.

Keep them coming please Anthony!  This is a lovely armchair trip.  But some more details please - what about the food and the hotels?  Don't you have any crazy incidents to tell us about?

Wow, this thread is almost as good as reading a book!   What extraordinarily beautiful architechture. Thanks Anthony!

Our tour had dinner aboard a boat that cruised up and down the Danube.  We tasted traditional Hungarian goulash.  In the US, goulash is a brown thick-gravy type beef stew.  In Hungary, it is a thin brothy soup, which I prefer.  We also tasted chicken paprikash, which is chicken seasoned with paprika.  What makes it unique is the Hungarian paprika, much more flavorful and hotter than the stuff you get in the US.  They also have sweet paprika.  I bought some to take home.

The sites from the boat were truly special:

Then, the night comes:

The city is most beautiful when illuminated:

Look at this bridge.  (The week before we were there, the city experience massive traffic jams because one of these river crossings, a main artery into and out of the Pest business district, was closed for the filming of Bruce Willis in Die Hard 5.  Can you believe that?  John McClain at 60 still running around and saving the world?  How lame is Hollywood?) 

Beautiful pics Anthony, and you have a beautiful family.  

 husbands been on my butt for about a year now to get my passport and when I mentioned these pics and how I would really like to do something like that it gave him the perfect opportunity to ride my butt yet again.

Anyway, love the pics, thanks for posting them.

Thanks Helen.

Good lord this is beautiful. I've never really been outside my state of Colorado but a few times and NEVER out of the country... These pictures are amazing and you'd think here in Colorado we'd have a great view of the mountains or something. No, instead we have man sized weeds, dead grass and a few trees (at least where I live.) This desert/prairie area is a gigantic matchbox waiting for its ignition system...