Budapest, everywhere anywhere.

Here are a couple of the sights one can encounter on a normal Saturday morning walk around Budapest. 

An overarching view of the Danube river from the Citadelle. 

A straight view of the river from the Liberty Bridge which connects Buda with the Pest side of the city. 

 

St. Stephen cathedral. It is a beautiful building in itself. This is one of the main places to visit around Budapest, a must see. It is highly recommended along with Hero's Square, Parliament, the Citadelle and many others that hopefully I get to see. 

Street art. It's not hard to find monuments, paintings, statues, and memorials all over the city. 

This eagle stand at the feet of a statue of George Washington which was surprising but interesting to find. 

The statue of Anonymous, someone attributed to have recorded the earliest history of Hungary but whose real identity is unknown.  

Hero's square stands between the Palace of the Arts and the Museum of Fine Arts. It contains statues of some of Hungary's most important historical figures. 

Lisbon, Portugal

The second stop of our fall break trip was Lisbon, Portugal. I didn't know much about the city before arriving there. It had been my roommate's choice to go, and I am so glad we did. By far, I think Lisbon is the most beautiful city I have ever visited. It has an incredible home feel. The narrow streets surrounded by bright colorful walls going up hill and down hill leading to a more majestic view of the coast the higher you climb. Most of the time you feel you are indoors covered by a roof of sunlight with windows that peek out into the ocean. 

The trams run along the streets which makes the city feel more like a real-life theme park.  

Tram 28 gives a ride through the best corners of the city. It has been labeled on of the top ten tram rids in the world. 

 

We rested under this incredible tree that held a tablet as if it had been writing its biography. 

The writing was an old poem about the importance of wood in our lives. It tells the story of how wood forms our cradles when we are born, our houses throughout our lives, and even the coffins when we die. I remember having read this when I was in 3rd grade. How curious to find it at the opposite end of the world.  

Fall break in Madrid, Spain

For our Fall break we had 7 days to wonder around the world. My roommate and I decided to visit the Iberian Peninsula. We had targeted two cities Madrid, Spain and Lisbon in Portugal. Here are a couple of pictures of the different sights we had a change to visit. 

The famous Plaza de Toros or Bullfighting rings. 

Oso y Madrono is a famous statue in of of the main squares of Madrid. Plaza del Sol is the square at the end of Madrid's most famous street Calle Mayor. The bear statue stand at the entrence of this turistic center. 

El Palacion Nacional is one of the most famous places not only in Madrid but in all of Spain. It embodies a tremendous amount of the country's history. 

The museums were not short of having important pieces of history. We got to see some of Salvador Dali's paintings. This here is called El Gran Masturbador. 

The most famous and historical painter we recognize was Picasso. There were many of his paintings including the famous Guernica we we got to see but no pictures were allowed. Here is a different painting by him. 

El Qujote de La Mancha (Quixote) is also embodied in many different way around the city. 

And finally a picture of the Palacio de Cibeles, Madrid's city hall. 

Spelunking

Also as part of the Budapest Semester in Cognitive Science we went spelunking or underground cave exploring. We started walking in and as we were surrounded by stone walls void of light my heart begun beating harder and harder. Then we had to walk bent over through smaller and smaller paths and my hart kept on beating harder and harder. But the paths also kept on getting smaller and smaller making us crawl and then making us slide through what now were holes made out of rocks, so small we had to push while breathing out because we would get stuck otherwise. Oh yeah it was intense.

Balaton, Hungary

The Budapest Semester in Cognitive Science took a trip to Lake Balaton. Balaton is the largest lake of freshwater in Central Europe. We had a two day trip and got to visit some churches, boat trough some underground water caves, hike, tree climb, and well... here are some pictures.

There was a beautiful tree which we naturally decided to climb. 

There were some great mountains from which the lake could be seen in its entirety. 

Langos a somewhat Eastern European dish. The photo does not makes justice to the size of a Langos. 

Some street art we got to see (finger painting). 

Underground cave canoeing. 

More street art. 

It was a great experience to share with everyone, specially over coffee. 

And many other adventures along the way.