Vaguely I remember Deutsche Bahn’s advertisement for overnight trains: “Arrive refreshed at your holiday location”, “Save one day of travelling”, etc.

Those reasons and a good experience on a trip to Denmark years ago probably made me decide on the overnight train option.

The journey started well. Turns out when you pay a little extra (and book early enough), you can make the trip from Balaton to Budapest in an airconditioned, reasonably new car. It’s only one car in the whole train but yes, that’s how I like my 21st century!

In Budapest I had about four hours of stopover and with the temperatures once again pushing 40°, I spent quite a bit of it in a mall not far away from the station. Needed to buy a towel anyway.

Fifteen minutes before the scheduled 22:25 departure, the waiting crowd was let onto the platform. Lots of backpackers, some older folks with small luggage. The seater cars we walked by where all in good shape but once we arrived at the 30-40 years old “couchette”, I started to have doubts

That’s hopefully something I’ll be hearing early in the morning tomorrow. The plan is to leave Révfülöp in the afternoon, arrive in Budapest without too much of a delay and then catch the overnight train to Belgrade at 22:30. Should be interesting one way or another.

Balaton has been relaxing and I got a lot of work and travel planning done. When I arrived I thought about leaving the next day but once I had found a few quiet corners, I stuck around for a bit longer.

Not sure about how representative for the whole of Balaton this village is, but if the rest is anything like it, then most of Lake Balaton’s shores are fenced off and only available to paying customers. The fees are low enough (€1.50 a day) but the whole setting is something that would make me not come back any time soon.

Again, that shouldn’t sound too negative. The Lake is really nice and the “hinterland” is pretty much devoid of tourists.

Ok, couldn’t fit more B-words into the title. Left Dunakeszi this morning by train and changed onto another train to Balaton in Budapest. Changing trains isn’t always easy there, as different parts of the country are served by different stations.

[caption id=“attachment_3213” align=“aligncenter” width=“450”] Dunakeszi Station[/caption]

[caption id=“attachment_3214” align=“aligncenter” width=“450”] “Manual Ticket Machine”[/caption]

In my case “changing trains” meant: Arrive in Nyugati, take a tram, take the Metro and arrive at Déli where

Saturday was a lazy day with a few hours of work in the morning and a nice trip to the area north of Budapest in the afternoon. View from the restaurant was pretty amazing.

Today I saw a little more of Budapest itself. With temperatures around 35° it was a wee bit warm for a city trip but it was never too difficult to find a shadowy area.

My walk led me along Andrássy út and its countless old and beautiful buildings, towards

This city has some seriously good looking buildings. Seeing the parliament for the first time is a true “Neat!” moment.

It should be mentioned though that not every building looks like it’s straight out of a fairy tale. The subway that took me into the city (M3) had a distinct Soviet flair.

Of course no visit to Budapest would be complete without