July 28 - Arrival in Budapest

After our long flight from Toronto to Budapest, we finally arrived about 10:45 am.  We were about 2 hours late leaving Toronto due to a number of issues, but made up time during the flight and arrived about 40 minutes later than we were originally scheduled.

It took a while to go through immigration, collect our bags, and find the transportation to our hotel, but we survived. It was very hot inside the airport, and outside it was raining and thundering. I saw a bolt of lightning hit the ground a short distance from our plane, just as we touched down. Too bad about the weather as it had been sunny and hot (as well as humid) here over the past while. I don't think this will last too long, but we are forecast to have thunderstorms again tonight.

The hotel is about a 45-minute drive from the airport. We were early for check-in, but our room was ready so they let us in. It is quite small but big enough for us to stay in for a couple nights. Nice bathroom with a shower, a queen bed, and a TV. What more could we ask for?

Our Room

We were pretty tired, so lay down for a rest and were soon snoring away. I struggled awake after an hour, but it was pretty difficult to get mobile. Then, I realized I had left my medication on the sink counter at home. So, we went off to see if there was some way I could get some to last.  We were pointed to a pharmacy, just up the block from the hotel. After finding the pharmacist who could speak some English, he gave us a suggestion about what we could do. Our plan was to find a fax number and I could call the doctor in Kamloops to get the prescription faxed here. Not going to happen.

Then, the pharmacist gave us a card for a company who will send out a doctor who will provide prescriptions for those not here. I cost 230 Euros to get the doctor to the hotel, but he prescribed the medication I needed, checked that the pharmacy had the meds, and provided me with official forms I could present to our travel insurance company in order to get a refund.

Down the street from our hotel

Well, we purchased enough meds to get us back to Kamloops on this trip, so I should be good to go now.

Our hotel is pretty much beside the big outdoor market and walking mall so we walked around a bit. Lots of little tourist shops, much like those in Alaska and other cruise ports. Lots of little restaurants, too. We stopped and had supper at one of these, sitting outside on the sidewalk. The reason we stopped there was because the little greeter girl spoke such good English, and we struck up some conversation with her. They had schnitzel on the menu so because we didn't get any while in Germany, we thought we would try it here.  It was quite good, and we were sure full. We both started with a small bowl of Hungarian Goulash soup. This was very good, just like our vegetable soup that Dawn makes now and again.

Restaurant where we had dinner

Then it was back to our room. We have a couple tours tomorrow, so have to be up early. Hopefully, we sleep well but I'm expecting that we will wake quite early. Right now I'm having a real problem keeping my eyes open. It is only 8:45 pm, but I don't think I'm long for being ready to sleep.Rest