Budapest

So Budapest is definitely my favourite place I've visited so far! OK, you got me, it's the only place I've visited so far! 
Firstly, a weather report. It seems that my reputation as a rain goddess is unchanged from my last trip. Today was meant to be dry but we had a quite a few showers, which may not have a been a problem had I not been dong a walking tour! Hey ho, that's what waterproofs were designed for!   
The tour was great and took us to quite a few of the major sights in Budapest and our guide Monica was fab. We started in Pest and ended up in Buda, obviously crossing the Danube in the process. Budapest feels really old and the buildings have a definite feeling of 'age' about them. But it turns out they're reallly not that old at all (in historic terms) with most being erected in the 1800s. One of the most beautiful places we went to was St. Stephen's Basilica;  it was unbelievably opulent with marble everywhere, and if there wasn't marble, then there was gold. Couple of pictures below for you.

Saw one thing there which was both gory and yet, with working at UCL, oddly familiar too! There is a Church of the Holy Right Hand... I am not kidding you. When they opened the tomb of St Stephen, they discovered that his right hand had been perfectly mummified and so they did what any self-respecting Basilica would do and put it on display in a glass case in a chapel and dedicated the chapel to it!!
The hand...
As I say though, being from UCL, frankly anything less than a whole body seems pretty pointless to me! (For those who are unsure what I'm referring to, try googling 'Jeremy Bentham auto icon')
Today I also had the prettiest ice cream that I've ever eaten!! Look!!
It's a rose!!! (obviously.... Be a pretty poor rose if you couldn't guess that!) seemed a shame to eat it but I forced myself!
Anyway, that's all for today. Will write again in a couple of days as I have this keyboard attached to my iPad and it's really playing up so has taken me ages to write this. Have a feeling I might end up ditching it and going back to the screen keyboard.

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