Wednesday 25 June 2014 Budapest

Cool cloudy with some rain 20C

This morning we were collected at 8.30 by Ildiko's son Adam and his girlfriend Sophie to take us to Lake Balaton. Ildiko is a friend from golf in Sydney who had invited us to come to her home in the country by Lake Balaton.

The journey was around 1½ hrs, she and her husband Alex have a vineyard and newly built house overlooking the lake, and it is just 500m from the golf course down the road where they both play. After a delicious coffee accompanied by a fare of cheese, olives and salami they took us on a tour.

Our first stop was to Tihany Abbey Church built in 1754 on the site of King Andrew’s church, The remains of King Andrew I lie in the crypt. This beautiful church has a wonderful outlook over the Lake which unfortunately today was very grey due to the weather.

The next stop was at Szigliget Castle about 30km from their house. Like all castles in Europe they are on top of the highest hill and so we parked at the bottom and walked up the slippery path to the castle. The views from the top were spectacular and you can understand why they built it there. The cannons and lookouts could see any intruders approaching as the views went for miles around.

We felt well exercised by the time we returned to the car, but there was one more stop on our return to the house and that was to the Golf Course. Ildiko organised 2 carts and we jumped into them for a tour of their fabulous course. With just 70 members and only 7 women members it is a very private course. She showed us the second 9 holes which looked challenging and well-manicured, it had everything, water, large gully’s to carry and small sloping greens. There was also a very extensive practice area with lots of bunkers and greens to practice on. The views from the course look out over Lake Balaton, what a wonderful place to play golf. There are only a handful of golf course in Hungary as they were all closed and destroyed during the Communist Era.

We returned to the house for a meal and enjoyed a traditional Hungarian dinner of Goulash, Lemon Chicken with Cous Cous and a dessert of dumplings which were filled with cottage cheese. We drank wine from their 1st Vintage, a Sauvignon Blanc which went down very nicely with the wonderful meal Ildiko had prepared for us.

By late afternoon we said our good-byes and Adam and Sophie very kindly drove us back to Budapest. It was a very special day and lovely to catch up with Ildiko and meet her family.

This evening we decided to go for a walk over the Elizabeth Bridge, Adam had driven over it this morning and pointed out the waterfall which looked very interesting. We crossed the Franz Joseph bridge then walked back towards the Elizabeth Bridge and walked up past the waterfall to a statue overlooking the bridge. We waited just 5 mins then at 9:00 pm, the lights of the city were turned on and all the monuments and buildings were lit up. It was a wonderful site and our photos do not do it justice.