Budapest in March

After a long winter March comes with hope and normally temperatures that make Scandinavians think it is summer. So, what has Budapest got to offer tourists dropping by in March?

It is useful to know that March is still pre-season in Budapest, meaning that you should be able to find cheap hotels and lots of half-full restaurants eager to have you visit them. If you are lucky you can experience temperatures above 15 degrees, but if you are unlucky it can be between 0 and 5 Celsius. In the best years the average temperature in Budapest is 10 Celsius in March, while in less tourist friendly years the average temperature can be around 2 Celsius.

Spring Festival and Spring Fair

The most important festival in Budapest in March is the Budapest Spring Festival. The dates differ from year to year, but the festival normally last for two weeks and it is packed with national and international stars performing in several different venues in Budapest. If you like ballett, classical music, jazz and similar expressions, this is the festival for you.

Budapest Spring Festival 2013: March 22nd – April 7th

Another popular activity that comes together with the Spring Festival is the Spring fair at the Vörösmarty square. This is very similar to the Christmas market at the same square, except from the fact that the weather is better and it stays bright for much longer. If you come in this period, make sure you visit the Spring Fair and have some Hungarian sausage, eat some Chimney cake and buy some hand-made souvenir.

If you are lucky with the weather you should also enjoy the best cakes in Budapest at the Gerbeaud confectionary sitting outside enjoy the first rays of the sun at the Vörösmarty square.

More cultural events in March

Since tourists start coming to town in March some of the typical programs start showing up again. In March you can for example take a look at a traditional Hungarian folklore program several times in the beautiful Danube Palace. Another popular program is the traditional Puszta programs arranged at several spots around in the nation of Hungary. At such programs you will normally enjoy a spectacular horse-show combined with lots of food and lots of drinks on the table.

If you like organ music there are concerts availabe in the St. Stephens Basilica a couple of days a week during this period, so that could be an option for some of you.

If you want to know more about Hungarian gastronomy and handicraft, why not visit the Handicraft Fair of Hungarian Flavours from March 8th to 10th in 2013.

Other March activities

If you are really lucky with the weather a great place to go is the Romai part. It is located north of Budapest, not far from the Aquincum museum. Here you can stroll along the Danube and eat and drink in an area that reminds you more of a traditional seaside than Hungary. Do not forget to visit the museum while in the area, as it will give you great insight in the history of the area.

Visit the Franz Liszt square and enjoy a lunch outside in open air together with both locals and tourists. At the square you will be able to eat traditional Hungarian courses and a whole lot of other stuff, of course depending on what restaurant you choose. We can warmly recommend Menza and Fresco Cafe.

In addition to these advises, here comes some general advises valid for Budapest throughout the entire year!

River Cruise in March in Budapest

All year round Budapest advises

  • Take a swim in Szechenyi Furdo, the hot springs are delicious
  • Go taste some wine on a Hungarian wine tasting
  • Enjoy the night view of Budapest on a Danube Cruise
  • Visit the Grand Market Hall and feel like a local
  • Taste the Goulash soup in 2-3 restaurants, just to get to know the national soup of Hungary

We wish you a pleasant stay in Budapest in March. If anyone have further advices or experiences, please write a comment. We would love to hear from you!

Colombus Budapest review

There are some restaurants in Budapest located on great places, and there are those with absolutely perfect locations if you want to enjoy good food accompanied by a beautiful panorama. Colombus is such a place.

Colombus is the name of a boat restaurant located on the Pest side of Budapest on the Danube. The boat doesn’t move, so it is lying still, but with windows looking towards the Buda side and with a terrace giving you a great view towards the Gellert Hill, the Castle of Buda, the Chain Bridge and lots of other Budapest attractions. The location and the view is perfect, but what about the food?

The wiener schnitzel, a traditional main course in Budapest

Colomus Budapest review

At the menu in Colombus you will find quite a lot of fish dishes and some traditional Hungarian dishes. We ordered a fajita with chicken and a traditional Hungarian wiener schnitzel, followed by two desserts. Service was good and the fajita and the wiener schnitzel tasted just the way they are meant to. For dessert we ate a chocolate mousse and a chocolate brownie (we do like chocolate). The brownie with ice cream was great, while the chocolate mousse was average.

Colombus is not only known for great panorama and good food, but they have live music available regularly, salsa evenings and other musical events. Many know the boat as a jazz boat, so if you want to combine good food with live music and wonderful panorama, why not choose Colombus. Next to Colombus you will find Spoon Cafe & Lounge, another restaurant boat. If I had to choose which place to visit of the two I would without hesitation choose Colombus, because based on my own experience I enjoyed my visit to Colombus much more than I enjoyed my two visits to Spoon.

The brownie was a good choice for dessert

The price for the one starter (the fajitas was only a starter), the wiener schnitzel with mashed potatoes and cucumber salad, the two desserts and two drinks was totally around 8500 HUF. I must admit that some people would pay that price for the panorama alone!

Colombus information

1051 Budapest, Vigadó tér, Peer 4

Panorama from the Colombus terrace

Have you been to Colombus yourself? Share your experience and write a comment/review. If you want to make a table reservation in Colombus, use the forms further down

La Perle Budapest review

Hidden away in a cute little street in the fifth district of Budapest you will find Brasserie La Perle. The restaurant has some French inspiration to it, but it is just as much an Hungarian restaurant as a French. Should you consider La Perle as a restaurant to visit in Budapest?

La Perle is located just across the street from the far more famous restaurant Borsso Bistro. While the latter has been around for many years, La Perle has only existed for about a year and it is still fighting to get some regular guests coming by. A few days ago I went to the restaurant with my family and we had a great time and I can warmly recommend this place to others, just keep on reading.

The interior of Brasserie La Perle in Budapest

La Perle review

Entering La Perle the first impression was very good. I liked the interior and the atmosphere of the restaurant, and I even enjoyed the background music. There were no other guests in the restaurant as we entered, so we got all the attention of the waiter present. We ordered four different starters, two main courses and three desserts.

You can feel the touch of Hungary in the restaurant as you look to the starters. Here you can find for example traditional Hungarian Goulash soup in addition to smoked salmon, goose liver and some other snacks. All the starters we ate were great, so do not forget to order a starter if you visit La Perle.

Tasty starter in La Perle

We were not really that hungry, so as we entered the restaurant we hadn’t planned ordering any main course at all. Out of pure curiosity we still ordered two main courses, just to check the quality and to see what a main course looks like in La Perle. We ordered a traditional Hungarian Beef Stew (marha pörkölt) and a sirloin steak with green pepper sauce and some more snack. I tasted both and I enjoyed them both and if I had more space for food I would have loved to taste more main courses (they have goose liver available as a main course and lots of other interesting dishes).

Highlight of the meal

If you have read a lot of my blogs posts you know that I love chocolate and I love pizza. In La Perle I did not eat pizza, but they had some awesome desserts. The number one dessert was their chocolate souffle (it has another name, but still very similar to a chocolate souffle). It was simply fantastic, and I still long to eat it again. Besides the chocolate souffle we ate a kind of cottage cheese cake/ice cream and a Creme Brulee. Both tasted great and I would love to eat that Creme Brulee once more in addition to the chocolate dessert.

The chocolate dessert tasted 100 times better than it looks on this pictures

Short wrap-up

I think about my stay in La Perle with great joy. We had a great evening together, and that is not only because I spent time with some of the people I love the most in the world, but because the food and the atmosphere was great. I can warmly recommend a dinner in La Perle if you visit Budapest, both to taste some traditional Hungarian courses, and also if you want to eat some French cuisine. The price of our four starters, two main courses, three desserts and five drinks were totally about 16,000 HUF.

La Perle information

Kepiro utca 2. -1053 Budapest
Tlf: +36-1-266-6808

Budapest tour on foot all alone

The reason that I came up with the idea to write this article is as follows.  Once a month I get visitors from the Netherlands (they are really curious about the city I fell in love with and of course they are also happy to see me) and my ‘’duty’’ is to show them around the city. When the first person came to visit me, I made a ‘’ Budapest Tour’’ and now I use this route for all my visitors. I would like to share this route with you, because it can be useful for you too maybe!  The route shows all the great sightseeing attractions in Budapest and nice places to lunch or have a coffee along the way!

The starting point is Déak Ferenc Tér. If you come by subway take the exit that says Erszébet Tér and the first thing you will see is Starbucks. If you are still a little bit sleepy have a cup of coffee here. Otherwise, skip this place and go to the left to Fashion Street. At the end of this street is Vörösmarty tér (This weekend there is an Easter Fair!). If you go to the left you are in Váci Utca, the main shopping street. I do not recommend buying souvenirs here since they are quite expensive. If your visitors want to buy souvenirs I would like to recommend buying these in the Central Market Hall at the end of Váci Utca.

After visiting the Market Hall cross over the Liberty Bridge, enjoy the amazing view and make yourself ready to climb the Gellért Hill. If you have reached the top of the hill go down and walk along the river till you see the train, Sikló, that brings you to the Castle District. Halfway (when you pass the Palace), have lunch at the first café you see (on the corner of the street). They have nice sandwiches and Latte Macchiatto (or other coffees).  After the lunch bring a visit to the Fisherman’s Bastion, the Matthias Church and walk through the narrow and cozy streets.

As you leave the Castle Hill walk down Ostrom street you will soon see Mammut shopping Mall (it’s up to you if you want to stop here to do some shopping or to go to Starbucks for example).  You can walk to Elizabeth Bridge or you can take the tram 4 or 6 to Jászai Mari Tér. If you get off the tram go to the left (you will see the Parliament already). It’s nice to walk along the Danube to the Parliament. After visiting the Parliament show them  the statue of Imre on the bridge and walk hand in hand with Ronald Reagan. Then walk further to the Basilica. After visiting the Basilica you are just only a few minutes away from Andrassy Út and that means time for a tea break in one of the cozy tea houses in Andrassy Út, the Book café in Alexandra Bookstore or you can go to for example La Delizia, the Chocobar or SUGAR. These are all close to Andrassy Út !

If you still have energy after an extensive walking day you can walk to City Park at the end of the street. My visitors and I do this always the next day (combining City Park with relaxing in Szechenyi Spa).

You can go for dinner in Nagymezö Utca (this street has many nice restaurants, for example Két Szerecsen) and have some drinks in the ruïn pub Instant (also in this street).

Have fun!

 

 

 

Pastabar – Eat the Street

A few days ago we wrote an article about the soupbar between Kalvin square and Fovam square in Budapest. The soupbar turned so popular and therefore the owners expanded and has now opened a pastabar only a few hundred metres from the original soupbar. This time pasta is being served!

I first noticed the soupbar because of the crowd standing outside the place during its opening time. How did I notice the pastabar? In the same way! The pastabar has only been open for 6 weeks, but it has already turned into a success, at least based on what I have seen and on what the girl selling me the pasta told me. The concept is the same as with the soupbar, except from the fact that the Pastabar has 4 quite large tables located outside the bar making it easier for their visitors to sit down and eat their pasta in quietness and peace. If they get bored they are allowed to write greetings and make drawings on the tables which are covered with paper, so maybe this is the place where you can show the world the Da Vinci or Michelangelo hiding on your inside.

Pasta of the Day examples

I guess the answer is quite obvious, pasta! As I visited the Pastabar and ate there they had the following four pastas on the menu:

  • Mustar ezredes (chicken, cream, mustard, honey, peas)
  • O.G. (chicken, tomato, garlic, wine, basil)
  • Momofuku (chicken, carrot, leek, sesame seed, soya sauce, chili)
  • Bolognai (turkey, tomato, carrot, wine, oregano, basil)

The prices are easy to remember, because all pastas cost 990 Hungarian Forint. You can buy drinks to accompany the pasta if you are thirsty and ½ liter of Coca Cola cost 280 Forint.

If you want to eat the food right away you will find forks on the spot, but if you want to take the food away they have this special handle making it extremely easy to care the box with pasta with you.

In the vicinity of Kalvin ter today? Why not have some pasta for lunch?

Pastabar Budapest information

Opening times: 11.00-19.00
Address: Kalvin tér
Payment: Cash only

Bruno Mars Budapest 2013

One of the most popular pop singers of this year will concert on 7 November 2013 in Budapest. The young singer was born in 1985 in the capital of Hawaii, Honolulu. His mother was a child when she moved to Honolulu from the Philippines, and his father moved to the Pacific island from Brooklyn.

Bruno-MarsHis father played on Latino drum instruments, and his mother was a hula dancer, so it might guess from where he inherits his talent. He was quite young, when he started to deal with music, soon after he became the world’s youngest Elvis-imitator, and after he played in the film, Honeymoon in Las Vegas, he formed the young Elvis Presley. After he finished the secondary school he moved to Los Angeles, where he firstly became a recognized music producer and song writer and he worked with stars, like Travie McCoy, Adam Levine, Brandy and Sean Kingston, but he worked on Flo Rida’s worldwide famous song, the Right Round. But the real success occurred after his work with B.o.B. on the song “Nothin’ on You” and with Travie McCoy on the song “Billionaire”. Both hits reached top ten places on several point of the world.

However he released only two albums, he got several awards, for example Grammy in the “Best Man Pop Singer” category, the ASCAP’s “Song of the Year” award, the Billboard, BRIT Award, the American Music Award, the MTV Music Award and the People’s Choice Award too.

Don’t miss your chance, come to Budapest, spend a wonderful day in the city and see Bruno Mars, how he shakes up the audience of Papp László Sport arena on this cold November night!

Bruno Mars concert in Budapest

Budapest Sportarena
November 7th

Tickets: WorldTicketShop – Viagogo