On the “Buda” side of the river lies Buda Castle, Matthias Church and Fisherman’s Bastion, collectively referred to as castle hill. In my pre-trip research I read that the views from Fisherman’s Bastion could not be beaten, so off we went. We went in a strange roundabout direction after catching the underground and popping up on the far side of the hill. A picturesque walk through the park and up multiple stairs and winding paths lead us to the city walls of Buda. After more stairs finally we popped out behind Matthias Church.
Fisherman’s Bastion is right in front of the church, offering stunning views of Budapest across the Danube. Entrance to the balconies and terraces of the Bastion are free and you can wander along drinking in the view for as long as your heart desires. We were suffering from a low lying fog the day we visited, so our photos are not as beautiful as they could be!
There are also a couple of cafes underneath the main terrace area which you could sit and admire the view whilst sipping overpriced lattes if that is your thing.
After meandering along taking fog drenched photos and pointing out landmarks, we decided to go inside the church. Only to discover that unlike St Stephen’s Basilica, this church charged an entry fee! The cheek of it. After googling pictures of the inside and lengthy deliberation we refused to go inside out of principle, and wandered over to Buda Castle instead.
Buda Castle, we soon discovered, is not in fact open to the public in the way we expected. It now houses the Hungarian National Gallery which is free to enter if you are so inclined. We were not on this occasion and instead wandered along the terrace of the palace admiring the architecture, autumn foliage and the views across the Danube. What a seriously beautiful city!
I don’t know what it is about it, but I just adore a green copper statue or dome, to me it evokes feelings of a whimsical romantic time past, of gallant knights on trusty steeds and kings and princes in chain mail. My imagination runs wild and Budapest provides these in abundance, I even love the look of the green dripping down the stone.
The prettiest way to get from Buda to Pest is to cross the Chain Bridge. With views of Buda Castle across the rushing Danube and the Parliament the grand looking buildings on the other side of the river. We wandered back that way to get back to Pest, but be warned it is further than it looks and there are quite a few stairs involved! There is a funicular – you can see in the very right edge of my photo below – but it was not running when we were there.
We finished exploring Castle Hill in Buda with plenty of time for more adventures in the afternoon! After a spot of goulash of course!
from tally to the thames 
So lovely! It may have been foggy but that makes it so much more atmospheric 🙂 buda-ful indeed! (I love a good pun)
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