Budapest Day one-ish
Jet lag as gotten the better of me so I am writing this at like 2 am on our “third” day here in budapest. I say “Third” as we left Dubai on at 9:45 PM on Friday the 13th! and we got into Budapest at 1 am on Saturday the 14tt oh. Oh the flight was not of the usual Dubai airport but of of the new, and lets be honest budget, airport. It was quite an experience going to the airport because it is kind of out in the middle of nowhere and you are thinking am I going to Abu Dhabi and even after the turn off you are asking yourself “Did I go the wrong way?” Well the airport itself is brand new (it just opened last month) and it is extremely small so there are no lines for anything. It is nice to be able to come to the airport and not have to deal with the normal hassles of travel. If we fly out of the new airport again I am going to go much later though as it literally took us 20 minutes to get to the gate - so much for arriving 2 hours before your flight.
The people who own the apartment we are staying at arranged transportation for us once we arrived in country. And then they met us at the door of the apartment building to let us in and show us the few things we needed to know. The only issues so far is that the keys are pretty temperamental and it seems that Andrew has the power to open the door to the building and Tita has the skills necessary to open the door to the apartment. 
Our apartment. Did I mention it was cold?
First day around Budapest.
The first thing we had to do was go and get breakfast. Luckily the apartment we are staying at is just down the street from a mall that has a supermarket (West End mall). The supermarket had a great selection and it seem to be the place for locals to pick up breakfast as we were by far the only people there. And if my math is correct it was super cheap as well. I am going back today to pick up breakfast again and I will let you know.
After a hearty breakfast of some traditional Hungarian pastries (very tasty) we set off to explore some of the Christmas markets of Budapest. 
Smaller Christmas market on the way
On the way - ranted the wrong way but hey- we found two interesting places. First we found the Opera House
And a Moulin Rouge
Well after some helpful directions from a local we finally made it to the Vorosmarty ter Christmas Market and while we were there it started to snow!!! This was the first snow we had seen since we left America in 2001 and possible the first snow that the kids will remember. Granted it was a light snow but still SNOW!
The Vorosmarty ter Christmas Market
David and Tita looking at some fine leather bags.
Some cool dried fruits for hanging around the house
Hungarian cake that is rolled and cooked over a fire- it kind of was like a cinnamon roll- will have to get one today to try it out
Don’t take our picture!
We bought some handmade chocolate but sadly they were not so great!
After we had some mulled wine and wandered around the Vorosmarty ter Christmas Market we went down to see the Danube and headed over to the Hungarian Parliament Building but stopped at the Széchenyi István tér 
as it was on the street going up to St Stephen’s Square. We will go to the Hungarian Parliament Building today as we are going to go across the Danube to see some sights (if I do not fall back asleep at 8 am).
St Stephens Square has a smaller Christmas market that we did not explore much as ile and we were all getting tired. But there was a real blacksmith there and he was making things out a real forge. Kind of cool- I know.
While at St Stephens Square we did visit St. Stephen’s Basilica. King Stephen was the founder of the Hungarian State. He died and was canonized on the 15th of August in 1038.
In St. Stephen's Basilica they house the right hand of St.Stephen which was found intact and ahs been highly esteemed by the nation ever since.
Saint Stephen’s Basilica
Saint Stephen’s right hand
After this we decided to traipse back to the apartment and were intent on taking the subway back but alas the automated ticket machine was broken so we had to walk back. I feel bad for Andrew as his feet are messed up.
Well this wraps up our first day in Budapest which was also our second day and now I have had two cappuccinos so I am not going back to sleep anytime soon- did I mention our apartment has a espresso machine.
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