The Best of Budapest, Vienna, and Prague

This year's vacation was to a troika of central European cities: Budapest, Vienna, and Prague.  They're a few hours apart by train, share some common history, and each is worth a few days, but none is really worth an entire vacation by itself.  In a nutshell, Budapest is cool and cheap, Vienna is refined and historic, and Prague is photogenic and romantic.

Here are some basics on what to do in each city:

Budapest
Must visit: a ruin pub for an only-in-Budapest moment and Castle Hill for the stunning views
If you have time: an authentic Hungarian spa
Pleasant surprise: great subway system; low, low prices
Feel free to avoid: Great Market Hall was a bit "meh" for us

From Buda, looking at Pest.

Vienna
Must visit: Schonbrunn Palace for the gardens; Hofburg Palace for the history; walk along Karntner Strasse
If you have time: go to the opera or a classical concert -- it's OK, you're in Vienna
Pleasant surprise: relaxing at a cafe with a dessert and a newspaper
Feel free to avoid: unless you're a devotee, the Sigmund Freud Museum

Try the maze in the Schonbrunn gardens, but budget 20 minutes to find the exit!

Prague
Must visit: Prague Castle; Old Town Square (beware the crowds)
If you have time: a day trip to Kutna Hora or Cesky Krumlov
Pleasant surprise: St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague Castle won the prize for "best church on this trip"
Feel free to avoid: We got to the "famous" astronomical clock in Old Town Square a few seconds after the top of the hour and we had already missed whatever there was to see.

The view from Prague Castle.

Tips for your Central European Trip

Here are some random tips based on our experiences:

1.  The Subway Police.  Each of the cities relies on an honor system for subway riders.  Budapest seemed the most interested in actually verifying how honorable you are.  At some stations, subway employees made sure you validated your ticket before getting on the escalator down to the tracks, and at one station, we were stopped and asked to produce our tickets.  They did not appear as vigilant in Vienna and Prague, but you shouldn't test that.

2.  Follow the "No Photo" Instructions.  Plenty of historic sites have rules about not taking photos, but the soldiers guarding St. Stephen's crown at the Hungarian Parliament were quite serious about it, as one of the people on our tour found out.  Too bad one of those guys' predecessors several centuries ago didn't take their job quite as seriously.  The crown was dropped and the cross on the top is bent at a 30-degree angle.

3.  Reserve Train Seats for Long Journeys.  We bought our Budapest to Vienna and our Vienna to Prague tickets online at the Austrian Railways' website.  They were less than half the cost of buying them from Rail Europe, which is a more American-user friendly website.  We were sure to reserve our seats, which is a good thing, because the train to Vienna was relatively full and across the aisle from us was a couple who hadn't reserved their seats, had to give up the seats they had claimed to their rightful owners, and then were trying to figure out what to do with only minutes to spare before the train left.

4.  Sharing a Table.  When you have a chance, share a table.  We went to one popular Vienna restaurant for dinner without a reservation and were waiting with 2 engineers in town on business who were in the same situation.  The hostess had a 4-person table and offered it to us.  We ended up having one of the best conversations of the trip.  One engineer was from Norway and the other from Germany and they were very interested in American politics.  I don't know what impressions those gentlemen had about Americans before the dinner, but if they had any unpleasant stereotypes, I'm confident they were dispelled by the end.

5.  Tipping.  Each city goes by a 10% rule-of-thumb, but at many restaurants, you cannot add the tip to your credit card bill, and instead need to pay any tip in cash.

6.  The Prague Metro.  Upon arriving at Prague's train station, we searched in vain for the sign for the entrance to the Metro, only to later find that it was this:

See the M?  Sure you do, now that I told you about it.

I had seen this sign, but merely thought it was a down arrow; I completely missed the letter "M" hidden at the top of the logo.  In the same way, I must have seen the FedEx logo for about 15 years before some pointed out to me that there's an arrow hidden in it.  (See for yourself -- it's between the E and the X!)

7.  Paying for Pretzels.  In Wenceslas Square in modern downtown Prague, we were away from the Old Town, and I thought we would also be away from any tourist-trap restaurants.  We saw a restaurant advertising "Authentic Czech Cuisine" and found a table.  The fact that the sign was in English should have been a clue, but we were pretty tired by that point.  Anyway, they had a cover charge for sitting down for a meal (in fine print on the back of the menu) and even charged us for each little pretzel we ate (which we had thought were just offered gratis).  Oh well.

Pretzels on the table?  Thank you.  How many did we eat?  2.  That'll be $4.

8.  Walking.  We averaged about 20,000 steps a day (10 miles, give or take), so by all means, wear comfortable shoes!

The Ruin Pubs of Budapest

One unique feature of Budapest is the ruin pub.  In recent decades, some entrepreneurs have taken old abandoned buildings (some since the time of WW2) and turned them into bars and nightclubs, all while maintaining a degree of cool dilapidation.  One of the most popular Budapest ruin pubs is Szimpla Kert, and it was a few blocks from our hotel and far from the more modern parts of the city.  After receiving a highly enthusiastic recommendation from our hotel concierge, we arrived after 8 PM on a Monday night and it was bustling.  It appeared to be 2 buildings and the roof was missing in parts.  Inside was a warren of little rooms where you could relax on a sofa, sit at a table of your choosing, or even in the back of an old Hungarian car.  Everywhere you looked, there was graffiti or art of one sort or another.  I'm not sure this place would pass an American health code, but the food was good.

I was concerned that it would be a little touristy -- and it probably is -- but I didn't hear a lot of English being spoken.  There were clearly locals there and the average patron's age was probably 25 (it was dark, so I still fit in).  Anyway, we had a good meal and I wanted to try the palinka -- Hungarian fruit brandy.  I walked up to a decidedly unimpressed female bartender and looked at the chalkboard with about 10 kinds of palinka.  I confidently ordered the first plum version on the menu, trying to pronounce it correctly in Hungarian.  She looked blankly at me and the following conversation ensued:

"What did you want?" she asked.
I said it again.
She asked me again.
And I said it again.
And then she asked, "Why do you want that?"
"Uh, I like plums?" (My confidence was waning at this point.)
"That's the worst.  You should try this [other kind of plum palinka]."

I wasn't thinking quickly enough to ask why they would serve something that she thought was so terrible, but in any event, the prices were the same, so I went with her selection.  Maybe she was angling for a tip because she was "saving" me from my terrible selection.  Anyway, the palinka was 100 proof and I don't really feel the need to try it again, though you should try it once.  And in case you get the same bartender, order the second plum palinka on the menu, not the first.

Here's the upstairs terrace connecting 2 buildings at Szimpla Kert.  You can see the various rooms along the sides.

Trigger Warning!

OK, if you're skittish about skeletons, mummies, and the like, you should stop reading now.





Still with us?  Of course you are.  On two occasions on this trip, we came in relatively close contact with some things you just don't see on this side of the Atlantic.

At St. Stephen's Basilica in Budapest, you will see a lovely church, but if you go into the little room to the left of the altar, you can also see a mummified hand.  And not just anyone's mummified hand, but St. Stephen's himself.  The hand looked, well, a little small, but I'm sure that just has something to do with the mummification process.  Meanwhile, I was jostled by enough people who were trying to get up close for a photo with the hand (which is behind glass, of course) that I wasn't sure what was more grotesque: the hand or the tourists!

Later, while in Prague, we took a half-day trip to Kutna Hora.  It's an hour's train-ride to the east.  It was good to get out of the big city and see a Czech town.  But we were really there for the bones.  In the 1300s, Kutna Hora was a rival to Prague, made rich off of its silver mine.  An enterprising monk returned to Kutna Hora with soil from Jerusalem and spread it at the local cemetery.  As a result, tens of thousands of people wanted to be buried there.  Years later, someone decided it would be a good idea to arrange the bones of some 40,000 people in the Sedlec ossuary.  Personally, I don't know whether it was a good idea, but it does bring the tourists.

If you go to Kutna Hora, I recommend getting a round-trip ticket from Prague to Kutna Hora-mesto.  You will switch trains at Kutna Hora's main train station (which is outside of town) and board the little train into town.  Get off at the Sedlec station for the ossuary (you really only need about 10 minutes there) and the "mesto" station for the main town, where you can go down into the silver mine (beware, tickets sold out by 1:30 PM on our visit) and St. Barbara's Cathedral.

Scroll down, if you want to see the photos ...

St. Stephen's hand in Budapest.

Some of the bones on display in Kutna Hora.

The Language Barrier

I don't want to be the stereotypical ugly American tourist.  I cringe whenever a team on The Amazing Race bitterly complains about a 3rd World taxi driver who can't speak English.  Therefore, I've always tried to learn a handful of basic words and phrases when I visit a country.  It's just the polite thing to do.  Sometimes, it's led to some funny stories.

When I was 24 and coming back from a vacation in Iceland, I ordered a specific Icelandic beer from the Icelandair flight attendant, said please, and thank you, and did it all in Icelandic.  She then started speaking to me in Icelandic, even though I look decidedly un-Icelandic.  It was one of the proudest moments of my life.

In Florence a few years later, I checked into a 2-star hotel and engaged in some very simple small talk with the desk clerk.  30 minutes later, the phone in my room rang.  It turns out the desk clerk really thought I could speak Italian and was calling to ask me to translate an incoming call from England for him.

Working for 6 months in France in 2008, I learned to read French fairly well, but conversations were always a problem.  The words just flow together so quickly in French, I had a very hard time keeping up.  And when I spoke French, at first, people would respond in English.  Later though, when people responded to me in French, I knew I was getting somewhere.  And then there was the time American tourists tried speaking to me in broken French.  I was really blending in at that point.

On this trip, we had 3 languages in 3 cities.  Of course, most people a tourist deals with speaks some English, but we wanted to make a good impression.  Fortunately, Kathleen speaks some German and did a great job with it.  But there was one museum cafe employee in Budapest we could not charm.  We were looking for the cloakroom and Kathleen asked her if she spoke English.  "Do you speak Hungarian?" was the rather coarse reply.  Well, wouldn't we have started in Hungarian if the answer was "yes?"  Anyway, we found the reaction more funny than off-putting, no matter how it was intended.