Keeping up with my schedule

I'm already finishing my third full week! Yikes - time is flying!

After two days of travel, adjusting to the time difference in Budapest, and then meeting up with the Global Volunteers team, I spent the first two weeks in Hodmezovasarhely (and yes, I can now say it!).

I left Hod a day earlier than the rest of the team, on Friday, May 2 and took the train to Budapest. I overnighted in a 6 bed dorm room in a hostel, the Mellow Mood, in District V of Budapest. I only had one roommate, although the beds were supposed to be all taken.

I then left very early on the morning of May 3, Saturday and took the train to Vienna. This was a three hour train ride and I slept through most of it, although I did see lots of rabbits in the fields when I was awake enough to look out the window. I also visited with a guy going to Vienna for a Tae Kwon Do competition. He was from Belgrade, Serbia and is an English translator.

I went to Vienna to meet my friend Kyle who used to work with/for me at the Dept of Labor in Juneau. He is a Navy reservist and enjoys working for the Navy under short term contracts. Right now his contract is out of Stuttgart, so this was a good place to meet, although his train ride was 8 hours and mine was only 3!

We had a great time in Vienna, going to a Mozart Concert and the Lipizzaner stallion show and walking through the gardens at the Schoenbrunn Palace. This Palace was home to Elizabeth, Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary. There is much named after her here in Budapest and throughout Hungary, as she was much loved by the Hungarian people. If you care to read more about her, here is an interesting article:
http://www.hungarian-history.hu/lib/hunspir/hsp35.htm

On Sunday, May 4, I took an afternoon train back to Budapest and went back to the Mellow Mood Hostel, where I met up with Annie, my Global Volunteers roommate in Hod. She is also traveling for awhile, so we agreed to travel together to Egar and Tokaj to taste the wines.

On Monday morning, I met with Vali from the school to check out my apartment and drop off most of my things as I did not need them for the three day trip. (The apartment is ok, and now that I have stayed here one night, I may ask for a change though.) After doing this, Annie and I headed to the train station and arrived in Egar after two very closely timed transfers.

Egar is a beautiful town in north east Hungary known for it's history in fending off the Turks in the mid 1500's. Unfortunately, they were not successful the second time, around 1590, and the Turks occupied Hungary for around 150 years. (My history is rough here - don't go quoting me!) Egar also has the largest Basilica in Hungary. We saw many school groups at the castle and through out the town. Here is Lonely Planet's website on Egar:
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/worldguide/hungary/eger/

We spent Monday afternoon walking the upper streets of the town and walking through the castle remains. The sky was dramatic with dark clouds in the distance. There was thunder and lightning with heavy rains that night. (Go to my photo web site to see pictures.)

Tuesday, May 6 was a wonderful slow day. We started with a walk through town and then found our way to the Valley of the Beautiful Women where there are around 150 wine cellars. We were very lucky to be traveling in the early tour season, as there were only two buses of tourists there, and the parking lot could have held many many more! Not many of the cellars were open, but we started at a hotel/restaurant where we had two different wines with bread and cheese and visited with each other for an hour or so. We then walked through the valley looking at the cellars, and trying the wine in a few of them. They are know for the Bulls Blood wine, or Egri Bikaver. This is a full bodied red wine. Can't get into all the wine lingo - just know that it is a wine that I liked. From there we walked back into town (about a mile and a half each way) and headed for the spa. The spa was a series of swimming pools and one warm pool. The warm pool was full - again, just can't imagine it during the high tourism season. We enjoyed ourselves in the pool for a few hours and then talked with the woman at the lockers. She was studying English from a book, as her daughter married an American and lives in New Jersey. This woman is heading there in September and wants to be able to speak English.

From the Spa we headed for a restaurant for dinner where I enjoyed an asparagus soup and caprese salad. Ok, not Hungarian, but I just can't resist those tomatoes with fresh mozzarella and basil! We had a very full relaxing day.

On Wednesday, May 7, during the morning, we wandered through the town again and visited the Basilica and listened to the organ. We also visited another church on the Dobo square and then found the Hungarian language immersion school and visited with the administrator/teacher there before heading to the train station.

Upon our arrival in Tokaj, we walked about a mile into town to our Panzio (hotel) and then made arrangements for me to use a phone in the middle of the night to call into the court for my dissolution hearing. I ended up having to pay $30 for the use of the phone as the desk clerk was going to have to wake up to allow access. There were no phones in any of the rooms in any of the hotels that we checked!

The town is about 5000 people, and really quite beautiful. Unfortunately, I was unable to take any pictures as I have fried my camera battery recharger and have not been able to find a new one yet (maybe today). Annie used a disposable camera, so I may be able to get a few pictures from her. We ate at the only open restaurant - a pizzeria - and then headed to bed early to be able to wake up in the middle of the night.

On Thursday then, we were up early, got our breakfast at the local store, found espresso, and then headed to the museum. There we got a full history of the area and a lot of information on the wine making. We then headed for the largest wine cellar where we tasted a full range of their wines from a dry wine to the Tokaji that they are known for. For info on this wine and the bull's blood, take a look here:
http://www.wineintro.com/regions/hungary/

Before heading to the train, we had lunch at a restaurant along the Tiza River (this is the same river we were on in Martary, just outside of Hod.) and enjoyed fish fillets covered in paprika and grilled. Annie stayed in Tokaj and will return to Budapest next week. I took a cab to my apartment and found easy internet access for the first time in days, hence all these entries to the blog!

My next few days will be spent getting settled in Budapest and studying English in prep for my class. I will also meet the 5th grade students and their teachers from Hod at the zoo on Sunday as they are taking a class trip to Budapest!