In July, 2024 we joined Grace’s son Larry and family on a cruise on the Danube River from Budapest to Vilshofen, Germany. Before the cruise began we went to Budapest, rented a car and explored three small towns (Gödöllő, Hollókő and Eger) in eastern Hungary. After the cruise ended in Vilshofen we took a train to Halstatt, Austria for a couple days before flying home from Munich.

Gödöllő

Our flight to Budapest arrived in the late afternoon so we rented an Airbnb that was not too far from the city and in the direction that we wanted to go (East). Gödöllő fit the bill and also contains a famous royal palace. The palace is particularly well-known because it was the favorite home of Empress Elisabeth (Sisi) of Austria and the Emperor Franz Joseph.

Hollókő

Hollókő is a tiny village about 45 minutes from Budapest that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site as it contains well preserved 13th century village. Unfortunately the days that we were in eastern Hungary were unusually hot, with highs well above 100 deg F. So it was difficult to visit places in the heat.

It was so hot on the day we were there that there were very few other tourists.

There were many fields of sunflowers along the highways in eastern Hungary.

Eger

Our primary target in eastern Hungary was the town of Eger, a town with a medieval castle and rich history. It is also a center of wine making and has a large thermal bath. The castle is well-known by all Hungarian school children because of the heroics of Istvan Dobo who led a successful and improbable defense of the city in the Siege of Eger in 1552 against a much larger force of Ottomans.

Statue of Dobo with the castle in the background in the central Dobo Square

The weather was stifling hot so the water fountain was busy.

Rising moon over Cathedral Basilica of St. John the Apostle

Géza Gárdonyi who wrote the popular account of the Siege of Eger, **Eclipse of the Crescent Moon**.

A frieze commemorating the Siege of Eger (1552) in which Istvan Dobo led a handful of soldiers against the invading Ottoman Turks, despite being outnumbered 30:1

Looking down to Dobo Square from the castle

Dobo Square with Istvan leading the charge

The northernmost Ottoman minaret in Europe

City Under the City

Eger is famous for its winemaking which has been going on for over a thousand years. Beneath the modern city is a vast collection of tunnels and caverns that were used to store the wine barrels.

Eszterházy Károly College

Library

The baroque library of the college is a beautiful room with a vast collection of old books, all carefully preserved and monitored. On the ceiling is a detailed fresco painted in the 18th century.

One of the treasures in the library is a hand-written letter by Wolfgang A. Mozart to his sister.

View from the roof of the Lyceum (Esterhazy College) building

On the top floor is a camera obscura or periscope that allows images all around the building to be cast onto a table top.

Budapest

Lazarspark Horse Show

We returned to Budapest to start our river cruise with enough time to catch a horse show at the outskirts of town. Hungarians are noted horsemen and the show highlighted their skills on horseback as well as in training the horses.

Riding a team of 5 galloping horses while standing on two of them

Budapest

Buda Castle and the Chain Bridge at night

Church of Our Lady of Buda Castle with St. Stephen statue

We were supposed to cruise by the Parliament building at sunset but alas, the ship sailed too late

Bratislava

Knight in armor on St. Martin's Cathedral

Another small world coincidence

We got to talking with two couples of Japanese-Americans who usually sat near us at meals. One of them looked a little like my brother Jerry so we began calling him ‘Jerry.’ After some discussions, we discovered that one of the women dated one of Grace’s sister’s ex-husbands and she knew the sister as well.

Vienna

I took a bike tour through Vienna in the morning. This was a good way to see much of the lovely city but not enough time to see more in depth.

Dome of St. Michael Gate of Hofburg Palace

Melk Abbey

This is a Benedictine abbey overlooking the Wachau Valley and Danube River. It was founded in 1089 but largely built in the 1700s. We took an extended tour of the inside of the Abbey but no photographs were allowed.

Docking the ship requires men to manually pull the boat tight against the wharf. Here they are throwing the rope to the man on the shore who has to ‘catch’ it with the stick.

Cesky Krumlov

One of the optional tours was a visit to Cesky Krumlov, a charming medieval town in the Czech Republic. This is probably my favorite town in Europe. It is nestled within a S-shaped bend of the Vltava River. A large castle with a colorful round tower, cobblestone streets with little traffic make it possible to imagine that you are visiting 500 years ago. Of course the large number of tourists and tour groups quickly disabuse you of this notion.

Panorama taken from the top of the castle tower

Linz

On the day we docked at Linz, there was a very large and crowded street festival. The town square and many adjoining streets were mobbed with visitors watching a wide variety of street performers. It was so crowded that it was easy to get separated from the tour guide leading the way.

Vilshofen

The AMA Waterways tour ended with an evening in Vilshofen, Germany where they organized an Oktoberfest celebration with lots of beer and traditional dancing.

Historically the Danube River will flood occasionally, usually with devastating effects on the riverfront towns and cities. Several of the towns we visited had high water marks on city walls to show the effects of flooding in different years.

Memorial for the voluntary fire departments that fought the flooding in the years 1319, 1320, 1595, 1845, 1850, 1862, 1882, 1905, 1941, 1945, 1950, 1954

This was a contest for two guests and one band member to see who could hold the liter stein of beer the longest.

Buderus’sche Eisenwerke

Sixty years ago in the summer of 1964, I worked for the Buderus’rusche Eisenwerke, a steel company in the small town of Wetzlar, Germany. Despite its small size, Wetzlar had several noteworthy traits. It is the home of Leitz camera works, famous for the Leica cameras. The greatest German poet and writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe spent a few years in Wetzlar, where he wrote the piece that first made him famous The Sorrows of Young Werther. And, of course, it was the home of Buderus’sche Eisenwerke which has been in business since the 1700s.

My job at Buderus was obtained through a program in the German Department at Princeton University where I was a sophomore. The department arranged summer jobs for students of German literature, language and history. That year they had more jobs than applicants so they opened up slots for those taking German classes. I applied and was happy to be accepted. As I recall they also paid for airfare to Germany with the only stipulation that we had to attend a reception for all students in Hamburg. Three of my roommates at Princeton were also working in Germany and France that summer so we got together at the end of our work and drove around German, France and Switzerland for a couple weeks. An idyllic summer!

One of the main products of Buderus, which was the most visible, was manhole covers so I was curious whether they were still on the streets of Germany. When we got to Vilshofen, I was happy to find many Buderus manhole covers in the streets.

Halstatt, Austria

After the tour ended in Vilshofen, we took the train to Halstatt for 2 nights before flying home from Munich. Halstatt is a scenic mountain village in Austria that is primarily reached by ferry that picks up passengers from a small train depot.

Halstatt grew up around an industry of mining salt from deep in the mountains. Now one can tour the salt mine which is still active.

One of the attractions of the salt mine is to ride the slides that were used to transport workers quickly from one level to another.

Looking down on Halstatt from the top of the salt mine

There was a funeral in town and the locals appeared in their finest attire.

Hallstatt during the blue hour after sunset

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Sep 3 Danube River cruise

Gödöllő

Hollókő

Eger

City Under the City