"Why didn't we fly first class?"
We had a first-rate trip to Budapest.
Every year our international school has a weeklong February holiday called Ski Break. Our family has never used it for skiing, although we have gone to cold places. Last week, we spent the break in Budapest. As I told people when discussing our plans: No skiing, just eating, drinking, and sightseeing!
I have been keeping a list of countries I visited (some earlier in life without my husband or kids), and I’ve also been keeping a list of countries we’ve visited (and/or lived in) as a family of four.
Hungary was our 20th country as a family.
ARRIVAL DAY
One of the many things we enjoy about living in Germany is how easily we can fly or drive to so many different places. The flight to Budapest was less than two hours.
Dragging our rolling suitcases and toting our backpacks through the airport, L asked me why we didn’t fly first class. “I’d love to fly first class,” I told him, “but Mommy and Daddy prefer to spend our money on hotels we’ll use during the entire trip instead of on airfare.” This satisfied him, and that was before we even reached the hotel.
If you’ve read my previous travel posts, you likely figured out that our family prefers Marriott properties; my husband’s status with them benefits all of us.
The Dorothea Hotel is a member of Marriott’s Autograph Collection. We were very happy with our stay here, and all four of us would recommend it to others.
After our non-first class flight, we enjoyed the welcome treats in our hotel room. Then we headed out to explore Budapest. As usual, we wanted to visit a local wine shop and choose something to enjoy in our room after the kids went to bed. VINUGO offered wine flights. The staff helped us choose based on our preferences and directed us toward options made with typical Hungarian grapes. We chose two bottles to purchase.
We had a dinner reservation at VakVarjú Restaurant, based on a friend’s recommendation. The atmosphere was lively without being too loud, and it was warm and cozy on a cold evening. They had an extensive cocktail menu. I wish I’d taken a picture of the placemats; children often get paper placemats for drawing, but at this restaurant everyone received a canvas. The messaging encouraged reviews, comments, or drawings. How fun! I used my placemat to praise the good food, attentive service, and fun atmosphere.
After dinner, we stopped by Beer People - Bar and Specialty Beer Store. My husband and I enjoyed the beers on tap, and the kids were enchanted by the friendly dog roaming among the guests. Although we didn’t avail ourselves of them, a display of board games was available for patrons to borrow.
We ended the evening with drinks at the hotel bar; we would quickly come to appreciate and enjoy the friendly service there during our trip.
DAY 1
Hotel breakfasts are a major factor in our family’s overall opinion of a hotel, so we were eager to explore this one. It was one of the best we’ve seen. There was a generous buffet of cold foods like fruits, vegetables, meats, cheeses, and pastries plus hot foods like bacon, sausage, and oatmeal, as well as juices, water, and sparkling wine. Various coffees could be ordered from waitstaff, and eggs to order were also available - omelettes, fried eggs, scrambled eggs, and benedicts. On some mornings, French toast and pancakes were made to order, and other mornings they were on the buffet. (This might have been related to some business conventions taking place.)
Our travel agent had booked us a tour for our first morning.
We often like a private tour of a new city. This costs us more in money, but it saves us in our kids’ interest level; a tour for just our family allows us to move at a more flexible pace. It also often allows us to be met at our hotel by the tour guide, which saves us time in the morning. A private tour also gives us a chance to interact more with a tour guide who isn’t dividing their time among multiple guests.
Eszter took good care of the adults and children in our family, making sure we all got attention and enjoyed our introduction to the city. We walked through the Jewish Quarter of Budapest, inside St. Stephen’s Basilica, and outside Parliament, among other highlights. My personal highlight was the strudel.
It is important to me to give and not just to take; one way I do that is by leaving reviews on various online platforms about our tour guides and excursions.
After the tour, we relaxed in our hotel room before heading to our boat cruise. An evening boat cruise is a popular tourist activity in Budapest because cruising the Danube with the buildings lit up is beautiful. Ours was booked for 4:00pm because we wanted to be able to have dinner at our usual time. As it approached, I slightly regretted that we hadn’t chosen a different time, but that changed when I realized it was snowing. The buildings weren’t lighting up until the end of our cruise, but it was snowing the entire time. Guests were treated to a welcome drink upon boarding and could order more during the excursion. L’s assessment was “Wonderful drinks and delicious snacks!”
We had booked a dinner reservation at Menza Étterem és Kávéház. They had extensive cocktail options and wines by the glass and bottle; the menu noted local options, which I always appreciate because I like trying the local beverages when I travel. There was not a separate kids’ menu, but both of our kids (one who’s culinarily adventurous and one who’s not) were thrilled with the fish and chips. I was thrilled with the chicken paprikash; I had been determined to try this Hungarian dish during our trip.
Again we concluded the evening relaxing in the hotel bar.
DAY 2
If you’ve read any of my previous travel posts (and certainly if you’ve met any of us in real life), you know we like food.
I’ve shared that one of our go-to activities when we visit a new city is a food tour. We appreciate expert guidance of foods characteristic of a place, and we also like the chance to get additional recommendations from tour guides. Our Budapest food tour was led by Ben, with Francesca in training. The group was small, just our families and a few others. Over the three hours, we tried salami, pickled items, lángos, chimney cake, goulash soup, and drinks.
After our lunchtime tour, we visited HOPS BEER BAR BUDAPEST then Szimpla Kert, one of Budapest’s ruin bars. It reminded me of my favorite diner in college, although that was decorated with Pez dispensers and doll heads, whereas Szimpla Kert had graffiti and some more mature decor (so if you go with your children, be prepared for a vocabulary lesson!) We were lucky to find a corner with reasonably comfortable seats where we could enjoy drinks and people watching.
Dinner was another recommendation from a friend, and it proved our kids’ favorite restaurant of the trip. The MAGIC had cauldrons, spells, and other wizarding decor reminiscent of a very popular franchise.
DAY 3
One of our tour guides expressed surprise that we were spending the entire trip in Budapest because apparently that isn’t common. However, our travel agent had already recommended a popular day trip to the artists’ town of Szentendre. For this day trip, we met our tour guide, Nikki, at a designated meeting spot (our first time leaving the Pest side for the Buda side), and she took care of train tickets for the approximately 45 minute ride. She even told us which side of the train to sit on to get a view of the Danube during the ride. Once we arrived in Szentendre, she gave us some light history of the town and gave us suggestions of places to visit there. The tour included a lángos lunch, then we had some free time to explore on our own before meeting her again for the train ride back to Budapest.
Since we were already on the Buda side, we walked around a bit before heading back to the happy hour at our hotel before dinner.
We had a reservation at Pörc & Prézli Étterem. Their service was friendly and attentive (including toward the kids), and their portions were generous. It was a warm, cozy way to end another pleasant day.
DAY 4
We were lucky to have snagged tickets for a tour of Parliament, but our time slot wasn’t until the afternoon. That meant a leisurely morning at the hotel, enjoying breakfast and relaxing. I like having at least one such morning when we travel, and mid-way through this trip was ideal timing.
As we walked toward Parliament, we passed several sites we’d seen on tours earlier in the week. We stopped at Huncutka Bite and Wine near Parliament before our tour. They had meat and cheese plates on their menu but they weren’t available until later in the day. We still enjoyed friendly service for drinks and a chance to sit and rest for a bit.
Interestingly, despite having purchased Parliament tickets online, we still had to visit the information desk in the lobby to receive physical ones. Thankfully, we’d arrived early so this didn’t impact our tour start time. Soon we were grateful to have received a 2:30pm time slot; this meant our group was standing around the crown when it was time for the changing of the guards at 3:00 (every hour).
It was raining hard by the time our tour was done, but luckily C had a great indoor activity planned: Flippermúzeum. I’ll admit that I was skeptical that I’d have much fun here. I’ll also admit that I was wrong (Mom and Dad, are you taking a screenshot of this?😉) Each visitor’s entrance ticket allowed them unlimited playtime on old school games. There were pinball machines, Tetris, and a plethora of other nostalgic favorites. It was fun for the kids and adults (kind of like Legoland).
On a rainy evening, Spinoza Café & Restaurant was an excellent location to have dinner. The staff were so kind and friendly, and the food was also wonderful. It was my first time trying matza ball soup, and it was flavorful and comforting. Also comforting was my cholent, an Israeli dish. I wished I’d been able to finish it. S (10) had the salmon and said it was “very good.” There was a designated kids menu, but the chicken tenders were a little too spicy for L. Regardless, we were all content with our experience.
DAY 5
Although we had nothing booked (besides dinner) for our final day, we had a loose plan. After breakfast at the hotel, we visited a bookstore. Bestsellers had a large selection of English books. Then we visited a rare Lego store, Kocka Bazár LEGO ADÁS/VÉTEL, where unsurprisingly lots of purchases were made, and a comic book store, Trillian Comic Book Store, where surprisingly no purchases were made. We stopped at Beer Brothers hoping for something light to tide us over until our early dinner, but similar to our mid-afternoon visit the day prior at Huncutka Bite and Wine, the kitchen was limited. Thankfully we had an early dinner reservation at Gettó Gulyás, which had been recommended by our food tour guide. Their flavored homemade lemonades were a highlight; S and I both enjoyed the sour cherry lime flavor.
DEPARTURE
We were sad to leave because the hotel had been lovely and comfortable, and the city was vibrant (even when it rained) and welcoming. Hungary was an excellent #20!
Superlatives:
Strudel flavor: Sour cherry
New food: Chimney cake (me, L), Lángos (S), Goulash (C)
Restaurant: Pörc & Prézli Étterem (This was hard for me to choose because we were happy with all of our choices.)
Activity: Food tour
Hotel cocktail: Clover Club (see above - gin, lemon, raspberry, etc.)
Reflection on Hungary:
Usually when we travel, I try to complete at least enough Duolingo that I can say basic things like thank you in the local language. Hungarian was the hardest I’ve ever tried to learn, and one of the tour guides echoed this.
Let me conclude with a plug for our beloved travel agent; reach out to her if you’d like her help booking your own trip to Budapest (or elsewhere!).
It was so fun to read about your experiences, Susan, since we traveled to Budapest this past summer! Loved the city, country and people, oh and the chimney cakes and goulash as well! We also loved our tour guide, Mesi! My husband’s family immigrated from Hungary in the early 1900’s, and we visited their nearby hometown. It was very special to go back and visit, so if you’re interested, I wrote two posts about all that!
Susan, I loved this so much. 🤍
I felt like I was being invited along — the details, the food, the little family conversations (the first-class question made me smile). I especially love how intentional you are about experiences over optics. That answer to L says so much about your family’s values.
Budapest sounds magical in the snow — and now I’m craving strudel and chimney cake. Thank you for taking us with you on country #20!