Last day for Budapest

My last day in Budapest was overcast and rainy, so luckily I had planned a day around museums and indoor activities!

I started off with the Hungarian National Museum which houses a large collection of hungarian artifacts through the ages, including some pretty old crowns, a silk and gold embroidered coronation mantle dating to 1031.

I headed up to the castle on the buda hills in the afternoon and visited the Budapest Labyrinth, a really unusual exhibition. It is set in tunnels far below street level underneath the castle and is really quite creepy. They keep it poorly lit, the ceilings are low and there are sensors in many rooms which start creepy music, percussion or heartbeat sounds when you enter. I would prefer if they started lights! I headed in on my own, but must admit it quickly became a bit much and I was jumping at shadows. Happily I waited for a bit (retraced my footsteps for a while) and came upon a couple of americans with their hungarian friend. I stuck with them! We wandered through together trying to figure out what (if anything) was going on. One of the americans was a boy about 12 years old, so happily he strode forward into the darker, more cramped corridors to scope it out before the rest of us followed - me often ducking my head.

Basically, it has various pieces of artwork depicting the various times - from prehistoric, to renaissance, the monarchies and present day. All quite strange and unexpected so far underground. Still, it was an experience and my heart rate went up a few times!!

I searched for the Hospital in the cave - which is also on (or rather in) the castle hill somewhere and is basically a more historic and educational look at the use of some of the tunnels and caves as hospitals during the war. Sadly, and despite maps and directions I wasn't able to find it... sigh! one of those annoying tourist things.

I was planning, also, to visit the Hungarian National Gallery which is housed in one of the buildings of the Royal Palace but there was a wine festival on, and some of the gallery was closed, so I gave it all a miss.

Headed back to town and to the West End City shopping centre for one last hungarian funnel cake and a coffee before coming home to get ready for dinner, and organised for packing for my flight to London tomorrow.

(yes, the funnel cake was worth it! now, how do I start a regular hungarian festival in Brissie so I can eat them again??)