During our little walking tour yesterday, the guide mentioned something called the Shoe Memorial close to the ship. Since there is no fitness center, the four of us, Carol, Barbara, Jim and I, decided it would be good to walk along the Danube not far from our ship to the see the memorial and accomplish two things at one time. As became the norm during our trip, each of the four of us heard something different so finding it was a challenge, but the emotion we felt when we did find it was worth the effort.
The story is that Hungary was willingly part of the Nazi movement with a very large anti-Semitic group called the Arrow Cross Party. During the war they terrorized the Jewish population of Budapest in many horrific ways but between 1944 and 1945 they began lining up Jewish people along the Danube, make them strip naked in the harsh winters and shot them, throwing their bodies into the Danube to float away. This memorial
was erected in 2005 to remember all those people who died. What you see is rusted, cast iron shoes of all kinds (dress shoes, children’s shoes, workmen shoes, and women’s shoes all of that period) sitting empty on the bank.
The horror and sadness was overwhelming but each of us admitted we were glad we made the trip. Now we had to get back to the ship to shower and dress, eat breakfast and be ready for our first included excursion at 8:40 am to see this beautiful city.
Home to 1.7 million people, Buda sits on the east bank is the historic section filled with beautiful baroque and neoclassical architecture and Pest sits on the west bank and is more cosmopolitan in nature and design. We drove by bus to various places within the city and it was easy to identify the elaborate old buildings and the utilitarian buildings of the Communists during their occupation.
We then drove to the top of the hill to visit Old Town with narrow streets of medieval buildings and the Castle District. Part of the district is St. Stephen’s Basilica named after the first king of Hungary and is now the third largest church in this country. 
The philosophy behind the church was that it should depict the stark difference between heaven and earth so the interior is very elaborately decorated with lots of gold and precious gems. You could not conceive the splendor in this church even seeing the pictures.
Next to the church is the Fishermen’s Bastion overlooking the Danube and the graceful Chain Bridge. Once we drove to the Pest side, we got a really great view of the Buda Castle which is the centerpiece of the district and easy to see why. Hard to believe a person or even family once lived in this enormous castle.
Parliament Building
After a wonderful lunch back on board ship, we left for an additional excursion we thought would be very interesting while we were sitting in our air conditioned home. The temperature today is at least 90 degrees but we still ventured to the Grand Market for a taste of Hungary. This is a huge two story building without air conditioning that houses vendors of all types of food and products available for purchase. This is Hungary’s answer to a Farm Market/Flea Market.
The big difference was that our tour had pre-arranged places in the market that were giving us samples of meats, cheeses, pickles, breads and pastries, and honey to taste and enjoy.
After tasting our way around the market, we had free time to venture out on our own where we contributed to the local economy. Trivia information I never knew: Hungary is known for its production of paprika and in fact, in 1937 the Hungarian scientist Dr. Szent Gyorgi won the Nobel Prize with his discovery that it contains seven times as much vitamin C as oranges.
St Stephens Basilica at night
Castle on the hill overlooking Chain Bridge
We leave Budapest today before dinner and sail all night and most of tomorrow to reach our destination in Vienna.
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