Budapest

Budapest Was Two Cities Until 1873 and Still Has Two Personalities

Buda and Pest were separate municipal entities – Buda the hilly royal seat on the west bank, Pest the flat commercial city on the east – until their administrative unification in 1873. The split survives in character. Stand on the Pest embankment at dusk: Buda Castle and the Matthias Church spires on the limestone ridge to the west, the Parliament’s neo-Gothic silhouette glowing downriver to the north, the Chain Bridge connecting them, and the Danube making the whole arrangement look deliberately composed rather than accidentally accumulated over centuries. Very few cities produce a view this consistently dramatic from an ordinary public footpath.

Budapest is exceptionally grand and simultaneously affordable by Western European standards – a gap that has been narrowing but remains real. The thermal bath culture, the ruin pubs, the paprika-heavy cooking, and the Habsburg architecture are all genuine features of how the city actually functions rather than manufactured specifically for visitors. It is also a city with serious historical weight: the siege of 1944 to 1945, the Arrow Cross killings at the Danube embankment, the 1956 uprising and the Soviet crushing of it. Enjoying the beauty while giving that history honest attention requires deliberate effort, and the city provides the material.

What to See

The Hungarian Parliament building (completed 1904, neo-Gothic, consciously modelled on Westminster) requires advance online booking for English-language tours, and a passport as ID at entry. The interior – the gold-domed central hall, the Chamber of Deputies, the Crown Jewels display – justifies every logistical annoyance the booking process involves.

Fisherman’s Bastion above Buda Castle gives the most photographed view in the city: the Parliament building framed across the Danube from the west bank. Go at sunrise: the lower terraces are free and at 6am in summer you share them with almost nobody. By 9am the situation is entirely different.

The Dohany Street Synagogue is the largest in Europe and one of the most architecturally ambitious religious buildings in Central Europe. The Tree of Life sculpture in the garden behind – a silver weeping willow whose leaves bear the names of Holocaust victims – is as affecting as anything else in the city.

The Shoes on the Danube Bank memorial consists of 60 pairs of cast-iron shoes installed along the embankment in 2005 to commemorate Jews shot into the river by the Arrow Cross. The shoes are period-accurate, ranging from children’s to women’s heels to men’s work boots. Five minutes’ walk from Parliament, quiet, precise, and not easily forgotten.

The Thermal Baths

Budapest sits above more than 100 thermal springs, which is a geological accident that has shaped the city’s social culture for centuries. Szechenyi Baths is a 1913 neo-Baroque yellow palace with 18 pools including three large outdoor pools at different temperatures. Chess players in the steaming outdoor water on Sunday mornings is a tradition that has continued for decades and is not a performance.

Rudas Baths were built by the Ottomans in 1550. The octagonal Turkish hall with its central dome is the most atmospheric of any bath in the city, and the rooftop hot pool with views over the Danube at night is remarkable by any standard. Rudas now takes on extra significance: the Gellert Baths closed for comprehensive renovation in October 2025 and will not reopen until at least 2028. Book Rudas ahead for weekends.

The Ruin Pubs

In the early 2000s, abandoned courtyard buildings in the old Jewish quarter (District VII) were opened as bars with mismatched furniture, street art on exposed walls, and prices that reflected cheap rents rather than tourist premiums. Szimpla Kert on Kazinczy utca was the first in 2002. This is not staged tourism: it is how Budapest’s nightlife actually developed from a specific post-communist context of empty buildings and creative energy. The ruin pub format has been imitated in cities across Europe and is still best in the original District VII context.

Food and Drink

Gulyas is a soup, not a stew. The thick stew versions served in tourist restaurants are not the dish Hungarians actually eat at home. Try the soup version at a neighbourhood place rather than a menu that translates itself into English at the top of each section.

Langos – deep-fried flatbread topped with sour cream and grated cheese – from the upstairs food counters at the Great Market Hall costs almost nothing and is one of the more specific Budapest food experiences. The Great Market Hall itself, a 1897 cast-iron market building near the Chain Bridge, is worth visiting in the morning before the tour groups arrive.

Tokaji Aszu is one of the world’s great sweet wines and costs less in Hungary than anywhere else it is sold. Order by glass at any restaurant; the price is an argument for buying a bottle to take home.

Practical Notes

Hungary uses the forint, not the euro. Withdraw forints from bank ATMs; exchange kiosks at transport hubs and tourist areas give notably poor rates. Use Bolt for taxis rather than flagging off the street. The Budapest Card covers unlimited public transport, free museum entry, and 20 percent off thermal bath entry; over three serious days of sightseeing it typically pays for itself.

The metro, tram network, and buses cover the city comprehensively. The No. 2 tram line along the Pest embankment is one of the better free views in the city and worth riding specifically for that. May, June, September, and October are the best visiting months by weather and crowd levels.