Sept 29, 2019 – Budapest, Hungary
While reading about places of interest in Budapest, I stumbled upon an article that spoke of the award winning design of two metro stations on the M4 line. We decided to go visit these two stations today and also to walk the Andrassy Avenue.
After breakfast we first took the M1 to Deak Ferenc station and then changed over to M2 to visit the Keleti Palayudvar station. The escalator from the platform to the Keleti station was really deep… made me a little uncomfortable particularly when Krishnan tried taking a picture without holding onto the rails :).
We walked one floor above to see the platforms from where regular trains arrived and left Budapest. Keleti Palayudvar is the Central Station for Budapest.
From Keleti Palayudvar metro station, we took the M4 to go towards Kelenfold (where the bus left us). The Fővám tér & Szent Gellért tér stations fall on this line, one before the Danube channel and Szent Gellért tar station after the channel. Please read this article about these two stations and why they won several awards – https://www.dezeen.com/2014/12/04/spora-architects-metro-stations-budapest-concrete-lattice-beams/.
The exposed concrete beams at the Fővám tér station was fascinating – have never seen that in a modern building.
We got out of the station and walked for some distance along the Danube Riverfront. There was some running event happening there.
We tried walking to the Szent Gellert metro Station thinking that it will follow the riverfront, not realising that the line crossed the Danube river to the other side. We came to the end of the riverfront and found this fascinating building … the Fishermens Bastion, but didn’t know it till we looked at it from the other shore !
We walked back towards the Fovam Ter Station and on the way, I wanted a picture with this beautiful tree that was shedding its leaves, particularly because I was wearing the Cooptex Tree of Life saree.
We can see some of the runners going by on the road below.
We took the metro and got off at the Szent Gellert Station. What a stunner this station was … the colourful tiles forming a mosaic that was just unbelievable.
We got out of the metro station and walked a little on the Pest side of Budapest going all the way till Gellert Hill.
We walked across the chain bridge to the Buda side and had lunch at Govindas – the ISKCON restaurant. The food was a lot and we had to leave off some of the vegetables as it was just too much for us. After lunch we started our walk back towards Heros Square down the Andrassy Avenue. Pictures from that walk will be part two of this blog.