Month: September 2015

Down to Szeged, Hungary! — How quickly things can change!

Hello, my fellow world travel enthusiasts! I am reporting from Budapest, Hungary!

Okay, so here we go — our final days in Hungary and Europe — WOW!

Our first class Eurail ride was a beautiful 50’s coach, in impeccable condition! We even had wifi!

We took a train from Budapest down near the border of Serbia, to Szeged, which held great surprises for me!

Walking to the hotel and water slide park

Waterslides!

Five stories high!!!

Yes, The biggest waterslides in Europe!

One of my favorites was shaped like a bowl, or a teacup when you got to the end of this really long slide you would go round and round and round until you fall through the bottom.

The red and orange “tea cup”

My parents and I tried them all out – although both of them did not like the teacup. You ended up dropping about six feet, head-first, a bit out of control 🙂

There were more than 10 huge slides and the whole park!

There were slides that started five stories up inside and then went outside, then came inside, and back outside where you splashed in the water at the bottom!

See Mama — Splash-a-rooni!

BTW – Can you say this street name?

The hotel, recommended by our friend, Andy, was awesome, too!

They had a wonderful spa that my parents took advantage of, and also, a bowling alley that we enjoyed.

STRIKE!!

STRIKE!!!

Szeged was a very nice and quiet town and the people seemed happy! Shocking is that today, just a few weeks later, we would not have been able to go to Szeged or enjoy Budapest the way we did, with the refugee crisis in that part of Europe now!

And we are, too!

Look for More Posts From Your Junior WorldTrek Reporter

STRIKE # 3!!!

Keep Calm and Travel Around the World

Budapest, The Jewish Synagogue and Tour

It is so hard to believe that our trip is coming close to ending! Wow!

Today was some serious and sad learning about history

You might know Hungary is one of the places attacked by Hitler and his Nazis in World War II.

We decided that we would visit the old Jewish quarter of Budapest followed by a tour of the synagogue.

First we went on a walking tour all along the Jewish quarter, learning about many different things all around the community.

The next place we went was the synagogue, the Jewish equivalent of a church.

This particular synagogue is the largest in Europe, and the second largest in the whole world.

If you are wondering which is the largest, it is in New York City. It is absolutely beautiful!

We went outside into the gardens and saw a silver metal weeping willow tree, deliberately shaped like an upside down menorah.

This memorial is honoring all the people who died in World War II. Each leaf has a name of someone who died at the hands of the Nazis, in one way or another.

Many of Andy’s family members were deported and only his grandfather made it back from Auschwitz. The rest of his family passed away in Auschwitz.

There was a mass grave to the side where over many people are buried.

This makes me very sad. How could the Nazis do this? However, there were some courageous people who helped save thousands of Jews. Carl Lutz was from Switzerland, and in 1942, was the Swiss Vice-Consul, in Budapest. He studied and lived in the U.S. for 20 years. While he was in Budapest this amazing man negotiated the safety of over 62,000 people!

Some were so young, and some, died just before at the end of the war.

Afterwards, we went to the Jewish Museum, where we saw various items used on occasions such as Hanukkah and Passover, as well as the terrible facts about Hitler and his army.

I could not stay long in the area about Hitler.

Once we we’re finished we went shopping for some souvenirs. During our walk, we stopped and learned that the Rubik’s Cube was invented in Hungary!

Then we came home to rest before the next day where we would be traveling by train — this would be a fun ride!

Stay tuned for one of my last Junior WorldTrek Reporter Posts

Keep Calm and Travel Around the World

Makenna in Vienna

Makenna is in Vienna!

Hey, that rhymes!

We arrived here by train, of course, and went straight to our Renaissance Hotel.

The Imperial Riding School Renaissance

The hotel used to be the “Imperial Riding School,” so it was old (but renovated), and there were photos of horses everywhere.

It was quite beautiful with all of the old paintings and stained glass.

That night, we went to the Parliament, which had a beautiful fountain with statue of the Greek Goddess Athena, which caught my eye.

The whole building had a sort of a Greek and Roman theme to it.

I wanted to understand why, so we did some research.

The architect of the building wanted to remind politicians working inside about their responsibility to history.

While in Vienna, we also went to the Vienna Museum.

We viewed many things from the creation of the city to present day.

Vienna is the largest city in and the capital of Austria. The architecture planning of the city is still recognized around the world and there are models and sketches in this museum.

You might recall, in the Sound of Music, the Baroness, Uncle Max and the Captain are driving from Vienna, when they see all the children hanging from the trees.