Saturday August 14, leaving Budapest

August 14, Saturday

I’m obviously getting confused on dates here, but I know Friday was Friday the 13th. We’re having a great time. Today we finally left the hotel (farewell Marriott) and got on board the Concerto, our home for most of the rest of the trip. It’s a lovely river boat, but we’re now down to two small single beds instead of the two king size beds at the Marriott. I think our whole room is about the size of the two beds at the Marriott, but it’s compact and nice. Grand Circle is giving us another free excursion today, again to make up for the perceived problems some of the passengers are complaining about. Frankly, I haven’t been inconvenienced at all.



We took a lovely excursion to a small artisan town today, where the shopping was great. Plus they gave us 15 euros for lunch. I bought the most unusual egg that will be in my collection. It’s called a blacksmith’s egg, and it’s decorated with tiny pieces of metal held in by about a hundred nails. The premise of this egg is that the blacksmith was so delicate that he could do this work on an egg without breaking it. I also got an inexpensive beaded egg that’s quite interesting and doesn’t look like any of the ones I’ve made myself. At the same store of the cheap egg, I also got a Christmas-ornament sized hurdy gurdy.

After our excursion we came back and were finally transferred to the ship. When we got onboard, we had a wonderful view of Parliament across the river. But once the boat made a u-turn to dock where it’s supposed to be, we had a view of someone else’s cabin in the boat we were docked next to. We are once again in the middle of the ship, which means that after we docked last night, we woke up looking at the underside of the dock. The guy from Grand Circle told me this wasn’t the case. He lied. If we go again on some cruise, we’re going to ask for an end cabin.

Speaking of Grand Circle, they really are quite amazing. Some of the people on this trip put two trips together and sailed from Amsterdam to Budapest, then will go from Budapest to Bucharest. But, those people didn’t get much of a boat trip at all, because the river was too high from all the rains they’ve had upstream from here, and the ship couldn’t get under the bridge somewhere. So they were put up in hotels and bussed from place to place. By the time we got to Budapest, the boat will still unable to sail, so they put us all up at the Marriott. So now they’re giving us another of the excursions for free instead of the $80 we expected to pay, and we got a notice that when we get home we will get a notice of a pro-rated settlement for the inconvenience. I told my tablemates at dinner I didn’t know how much it would be, but I wouldn’t pay more than $100. They will probably give us some kind of a discount on the next trip we make. And of course, the food on board is great – and in great quantities.

I think I just uploaded the wrong pictures for today, but you'll just have to try to figure it out.

Day Three, A medieval day

Today is the day they gave us the free trip to make up for our having to stay in this nice Marriott. In many ways this trip was nice, but it was kind of all the things that make going on the old lady bus kind of annoying. You get off the bus, they have promised you a potty break, which means you wait about 20 minutes while everyone in your group visits the bathroom, then there is a half hour left to see everything at the site, but if, as at this one, there is a lot of walking, you will all walk at the pace of the slowest person. Which means that you might have wanted to spend a little bit of time inside the oldest church in Hungary examining the marble statues, but it’s now time to move at a snail’s pace back to the bus. The church is striking, and was built in the 1600s to honor St. Stephen, but when they started doing the work, they discovered an even older chapel from the 1200s or so, made of red marble (an indiginious stone) so they changed the plan of the church to incorporate this older chapel. It’s quite a wonderful church, in a high spot overlooking the Danube and where you can see Serbia across the river. There’s a “friendship bridge”but our guide tells us there was little friendship between these two peoples. There’s also a statue at the top of the area showing the Pope’s legate crowning St. Stephen.

We looked down from this statue on a charming little town with a white church steeple and lots of red roofs. Then it turned out that’s where we were going to see the remains of a castle King Mathias built for his second wife. It was pretty interesting for a ruin, because so much of it was based on speculation as little exists except the footprint of the original building.

Following this, we were treated to a medieval style dinner – Venison soup – very good, all the wine you could drink – too much, followed by main course of spare ribs, turkey legs and really good potatoes – enough – and some sort of hazelnut dessert mit schlag. Once again we left a meal stuffed. So stuffed, in fact that we are both skipping the FREE meal tonight in favor of going to McDonald’s to upload this blog, and taking a little walk to get a gelato. Then we must pack because we finally have our boat and will move to the boat tomorrow. So we will be packing tonight after we get home.

Tomorrow morning we get a tour to a country area with what’s supposed be a great artisan’s market where we can buy tschachkas and other stuff we certainly wouldn’t want to be without. After the morning tour and lunch, we hope to go to this wonderful spa and spend the afternoon relaxing while others go to the Parliament.

Today’s pictures St. Stephen’s, St. Stephen being crowned, King Mathias castle ruins, town below St. Stephens, Budapest public market.
Dinner,

Day Two Up the River without boat, still

Busy day today. This morning we had a city tour, and went to the castle across the river, where we were able to walk around the grounds for about 15 minutes. We saw a wonderful church there with a wonderful multi colored tile roof. These tiles are very strong and stand up to both heat and cold, but the brightness of the colors only lasts for about five years. We happened to arrive the year they have been replaced so it looks wonderful. I think the name of this church is St. Miklas, but this may just be one of many things I have wrong.
We also visited St. Stephen’s church, which was built in the 1800s and took about 20 years to finish. This isn’t the St. Stephen of December 26, it’s the St. Stephen of Hungary who brought Christianity to Hungary and is its most important saint. His day is August 20, I think, something that’s coming up soon. It’s a beautiful church inside, but it seems to me that stained glass art isn’t at a particularly high level in Hungary. We also visited heroes square, which I found relatively boring. Lots of equestarian statues, and lots of standing around in the sun.

It’s quite warm today, and of course we’re still wearing the clothes we arrived in, though the airlines said that it will deliver our clothes tonight, and they did. Yay. Clean underwear! I have managed to find two places so far with free wi-fi – McDonald’s and the restaurant where we had dinner tonight. The hotel charges $30 a DAY. Screw that. Because of heavy rains in Poland and elsewhere upstream, our boat is unable to make it to Budapest, so they are putting us up in a wonderful Marriott, about which the only thing I can find to bitch about is the $30 a day for internet access. Grand Circle, in addition to putting us in this nice place, is giving us one free tour of the extras we would have had to pay $80 for to make up for the inconvenience. I’m quite sure our room in the Marriott is much nicer than our cabin on the ship was going to be, and we were going to be in Budapest for three days anyway. Apparently, our boat can’t even start until Sunday from wherever it is they are. I’m happy no matter what.

This afternoon we had a tour of the Jewish quarter. There is an old orthodox synagogue and a newer “neo” synagogue, which apparently is what would be either a conservative or reform in the U.S. More liberal at any rate. Both are decorated in the moorish style – the neo because it was fashionable in the early 1900s when it was built (in only four years, compared to 20-something for St. Stephens, because, as our guide said, “the government was involved in St. Stephen’s.) The new synagogue is also the place where the Nazi’s herded the Jews that hadn’t been sent off to Aushwitz in the winter of 1944-45 and where several hundred of them starved or froze to death. There is a monument there in metal (aluminum? Stainless steel?) that has names engraved on all the leaves of people who died in the holocaust. In addition to being a weeping willow, it is also an upside-down menorah. It’s a very moving piece – about the size of a real weeping willow tree.

Dinner was at a fun basement restaurant called Geraud’s and was good with Hungarian dumpling-type things that are sort of like gnocchi, and some beef paprikash. I thought it was wonderful. Free beer,and a 7 layer chocolate cake with carmelized crust on top for dessert. Yum.
Wandered home along the tourist street, found out where to get gelato if there’s ever a five-minute period when I haven’t been fed within the last half hour.

Tomorrow we take the Medieval Hungary tour which promises to be interesting. I hope to go have a coffee at McD’s tomorrow night so I can upload this and pictures. So far I’ve only managed to send the occasional email while standing out in front of McDonald’s – which is the only free internet I’ve found in the neighborhood. I’ve found a number of places with unsecured, but haven’t been able to connect to them

Pictures: New synagogue, old synagogue, willow memorial, willow leaves, palace across from our hotel at night, inside St. Stephen’s dome in Budapest.

One, Up the River without a boat

August 11, the first full day of our trip.

This day was spent mostly on planes and on a very long walk through Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris.

Tuesday we boarded the plane for a 3:30 p.m. flight in San Francisco, for a ten hout flight on Air France to Paris, followed by a 1 hour 45 minute flight on a tiny plane to Budapest. Because of all the electronics, jewelry making equipment and jewelry I feel obligated to take on a trip, my backpack is quite heavy. So I have learned to put my cosmetics and other liquids in my suitcase, well wrapped to eliminate some of the weight.

This,, in general, is a good policy, except when the airline loses your luggage and you have no lotions, potions, or toothbrush, not to mention not having a change of underwaear. And that, is the case tonight. But I’m sure, said Pollyanna, that our luggage will be here tomorrow. For one thing, there are two more flights today from Paris, so if the luggage doesn’t go around the world without us, we’ll be fine. The worst thing I am missing is the charger for my camera. Oh no, I might not be able to take a thousand pictures tomorrow.

While the Paris airport staff was putting our luggage on a flight to Australia, Zoe and I were maneuvering what seemed like about a mile in the airport. At one point Zoe’s shoe loosened, I guess, and she went sprawling down on the lovely marble floor with a fine splat. She seems not to have done any permanent injury, I hope, but I’ll bet she’ll be pretty sore in the morning. Because of lots of rain in Hungary and north, the boat we are supposed to be on is not able to go under the bridges to get here, so they are putting us up in the Marriott. It’s a a nice hotel with a lovely view of the river and what appears to be a palace across the river, but they want $30 a night to connect to the internet. Even addict that I am, I won’t pay that, so this will get uploaded whenever I can take this computer over to McDonaldds (about two blocks from here) and upload it there.

At some point there will be pictures, but it is always a challenge to get them where I want them in the blog, so they will probably just all be at the top of each day’s page and you’ll have to guess what they are pictures from without having a nearby reference.

I have the ipod in my purse, and I can write email without being on line, and just let it send as I walk past anyplace with free wi-fi.

If there are pictures with this, they are of the palace across from our hotel, in fact from our window, -- we have a wonderful view, because they are the only pictures I took today.

Grandma blog and Blue Moon Gallery

Today's blog isn't about much except a way to share some pictures of Rina.
They came over a couple of days ago so Mike could use my printer, and of course Rina wanted to go out in the back yard so she could play in the fountain. Except, when she got out there, there were ripe tomatoes and they were at Rina height. There was one she was really interested in, but it wasn't ripe. I gave her another one off the other bush, and she ate it like other kids eat candy. Then she went over to the heirloom tomato bush, and wanted one of those. So she had a bigger one. Then she went back to the not quite ripe one and kept handling it, and finally just leaned over and bit it on the bush! I kept trying, but I couldn't actually get a picture of that.
Is this kid a real Italian, or what?

And one more thing: I now have a page on the Blue Moon Gallery website. Check it out here Thanks, Carol.

Two visits to the Impressionists - French and California

Last week Zoe, Billie, and I went to San Francisco to see the Impressionist Exhibit. This is a great exhibit that's going around the U.S. and probably other places as well, while the d'Orsay Museum in Paris undergoes a year-long renovation. There are actually two exhibits traveling around and San Francisco is the only place getting both of them.

John was supposed to go with us, but at the last minute, he was really too sick to go, so the three of us went anyway. Nobody ever accused me of being a nice guy. So we knew that the day we decided to go, July 1, was the day they were raising the bridge tolls, and while we had planned to go during rush hour to take advantage of the free carpool lane, all the rules had changed and that was now the most expensive option. We ended up going around the bay and across the Golden Gate bridge for one $6 toll.

The exhibit was great, though predictably crowded and had kind of the first half of the Impressionist period. No Van Gogh's for instance, but lots of really good stuff. It's now two weeks later and I can't remember a single name. We also went to the Legion of Honor for another show that's of posters, drawings and advertising flyers from the same era. They were also very interesting.

Then this Thursday, John, Zoe and I went to Stockton, where they have a wonderful exhibit of California Impressionists (which is probably my favorite school of art) from the Irvine Museum. John and I and Vera and Bill had tried to go to the Irvine Art museum several years ago with disastrous results. The place we ended up was some sort of an industial park and when we finally found the museum, it was a day it was closed. So this time we finally got to see the paintings.

We were astounded at what a good museum this little Haggin Museum in Stockton is. First of all, it's a nice building and a lovely park. The entrance is only $5 ($2.50 for seniors) and they had all these really great paintings on loan. Additionally, they had a very interesting show of posters by Leyendecker, an illustrator who was a contemporary of Parrish and Norman Rockwell, and did rather Rockwellian-type work, though he painted many of his in oils originally. The museum appears to have a smallish collection of its own paintings, but they are really quite good. The other special exhibit was of women's clothing from about 1860 to 1910 or so. As always, I looked at those tiny waists and could hardly breathe. And of course, since this museum is only in Stockton and only 45 miles from here and no bridge tolls, it was a pretty inexpensive trip. We even got to go to Sizzler with the rest of the senior citizens for lunch.

Last night Zoe had us over to dinner with Tim and Lynda. She made these great tri-tip sandwiches, some wonderful beans, and cole slaw from my food channel magazine. I got to find out how good that recipe was without going to the work of actually making it myself. She also made a great berry cobbler with ice cream. Frankly, none of this was good for my diet, but I've been pretty good for four whole days.

I have a harp gig tonight that's going to include hors d'oeuvres, which will probably be a problem, but perhaps I'll just confine myself to a bit of wine. It is finally getting easier for me to jog in the morning. Not that I like it any better, but my hips and knees aren't hurting so badly. I'm trying to decide if it's the calcium pill I've been taking for the week, or the fact that I've been trying to stay away from things I know are bad (read fat) and eat stuff with lots of anti-oxidants. I've been actually drinking milk (yuck) mixed with Alba -- which was kind of a staple of mine way back when I was in weight watchers. It's a really low cal way to make a milkshake out of skimmed milk and actually makes it possible for me to imbibe milk.


Finally, I scored big at a yard sale this morning. In two ways. First, I bought an old typewriter (the keys are very much in demand for jewelry and craft projects) and secondly, I got John to carry it home for me. The damn thing must have weight 25-30 pounds. It took me about an hour to get all the keys off, and I only ruined about three of them. Now I just have to figure out how to put something on them so I can string them or something.

Neighborhood Watch

Just as we had finished watching Hercule Peirot tonight I heard one quick beep of a siren pretty much right outside the door and of course went ou to check it out. Three cop cars there already, and a fourth and fifth came up while I was watching.

Seemed not too big a deal, but they got three people out of the car (all being pretty cooperative, it seemed -- two men and a woman) cuffed 'em, sat 'em down on the curb and then stood around forever. Didn't seem all that interesting, except that I noticed that all the cars that were pointing away from me were CHP, and I couldn't see the one that was pointed towards me, except for the headlights.

John came out and we sat there and watched for awhile, then I went in the house and got out the binoculars, because, like, you know, you don't want to miss anything. After they stood around for quite awhile (this started about 10:30 p.m. and I just came back in the house and it's midnight) they started going through the car. First I thought they were searching it, then it looked like they were just getting the people's (the perps'?) stuff out of it. But then they opened the back of the car and took out the tires and I think eventually took out a rifle of some kind, something that might have been some kind of automatic weapon. But I was trying to see this from across the street with two very large trees and some wimpy bushes somewhat obstructing my view. I can still hear the cop heliocopter flying around near Broadway somewhere, so I'm wondering if these people were suspects in something else that went down, rather than just a DUI or whatever. I don't think they usually arrest everybody in the car for DUI.

In addition to us, a bunch of guys from the half way house, who are no doubt not strangers to this scenario themselves, came down and watched for awhile, and a couple carrying a baby walked right over there and past the scene of the action, and when they had satisfied themselves, walked back. I don't think I'd be taking a baby right up to that, myself. But then again, most people wouldn't sit on their front porch with binoculars, either. I will probably pay for this with a bunch of new mosquito bites tomorrow.

We're finally going to get new windows in our back sunporch -- though I think it's a long ways away -- but we're trying to get all the crap out of there, which in my case seems to necessitate making a complete mess of the other bedroom while doing it. Last weekend Lynda and I had a yard sale. I spent most of my earnings at the bead show this weekend, though. I did get rid of a lot of stuff up there, but there's still a lot more there. We're mostly down to paper products like books of music -- a whole bookcase full -- paper of various kinds that I might someday use, but usually can't find when I want it. I believe that all of this can probably be put into the desk in the bedroom, but it's tedious process and of course involves throwing away junk that's in the desk. I think I'm also going to have to put the computer on that desk for the duration of the project, too. I already have one box of junk ready for the next yard sale, and may get another before I go to bed.

No more news that's fit to print this weekend.