The Ladd Family: March 2008

Seven months into our adventure, we have now hit our 6th country, including Poland of course. With a long weekend ahead of us for the Easter weekend, we decided to travel to Budapest, the capital of Hungary, just south and east of Poland. With 98% of the population in Poland being Catholic, the whole country practically shuts down during Easter, so it was a good time to exit stage left.

First of all, we decided to take the night train to and from Budapest. So, we got a sleeper cabin that sleeps up to 6, but we just had the 4 of us. Brody and Ariana on the top bunk and Chris and Corey on the bottom bunks, though there was some switching of course. The train was certainly one of the highlights for the kids. It was like a travelling hotel, but no TV. Luckily they had Samuel and Vanessa to play with.

In the city, we hit some hot spots including the Turkish Baths, the Hungarian Parliament (missed the tour), the Opera House (chose to skip the tour), St. Stephen's Basilica, the Szechenyi Hill Funicular cog train, the Citadel, the Transport Museum, Buda Castle, Fisherman's Bastion, and the Labyrinth of Budavair.

Swimming and steaming with hundreds of other Europeans of all ages, in all sorts of bathing attire, in pools of natural, hot spring water that smelled a little like sulfur, was an experience that is hard to explain. I will leave that to your imaginations.

We also had a little bit of unexpected exitement. First, there was the lady who tried to leave the baths without paying and got into an animated Hungarian argument with the "bouncer," that almost turned to fistacuffs. Then, there was the drunk guy who fell down one of those long escalators that leads to the subway. Given his bloody head and wobbly exit, he likely awoke the next morning with a bigger headache than is expected, even for a drunk. What a good lesson that was for the kids in terms of "just say no" and "hold the handrail!"

Also unexpected was passing the Hungarian track and field team training on some cobblestone steps leading up to the old part of the city. One guy, the long jumper, was jumping UP 5 steps at a time and did that for 2 flights of stairs. The others were sprinting up and being timed.

Brody of course enjoyed the WWII bunker on top of the Citadel Hill that was used by the Germans, Russians and Hungarians at various points. Both Brody and Ariana enjoyed the train and boat displays at the Transport Museum. The parents enjoyed both Buda on the west side of the river Danube, and Pest on the east side of the river, especially the view from Fisherman's Bastion and the hike up to the Citadel, which overlooked the entire city. Fun too was our nice dinner out at a Hungarian restaurant where we had a violin player play "Hava Nagilla" and "If I Were a Rich Man" at our table. Brody and Ariana loved that and were asking for other songs like "Tradition," all from Fiddler on the Roof.

That's it for now. We have visitors coming from DFW this week...Chris' folks. They are staying for a month, and we will be travelling to Barcelona with them. Look for an update on that in mid-April.

As usual, we have been very busy. Recent highlights are Ariana's birthday and our trip to the Kosciuszko Mound.

The mound is quite a treat. It is about 100 feet tall, dates back to the 1820's, and represents Poland's fight for independence. We took a trolley to a nearby area and then walked about a mile and a half up a beautiful tree lined, cobblestone, old street up to the base of the mound where there is an old fortress and church. From the top, we were greeted with the best full view of Krakow I have seen.

Ariana celebrated her birthday, not on the mound, but here at our apartment. Her birthday was on March 14 which is celebrated at her school as "pi" day (as in the number that starts with 3.14 which is March 14 if you look at it a little metaphorically). Chris and I had the pleasure of spending 4 hours with Ariana and 10 of her closest friends from her new Krakow community (France, Sweden, Germany, India, UK, USA, etc.). Par usual, Happy Birthday was sung to her in multiple languages, further feeding her impatience at digging into the chocolate brownie and ice cream that stood before her, as candles burned to the base. The theme was Hollywood Starletts, and all the girls played dress up and then designed new clothing styles with toilet paper and crepe paper. No different from the US, we served pizza and got the kids juiced up on sugar before handing them back to their parents with a party favor full of candy treats.