Changes

There are many, many great hotels in Budapest (and even more shitty ones), I'll only recommend one (- and I've stayed if in a few dozen), I'll only recommend one: the '''Corinthia Hotel Budapest'''. <br>This place has it all, : the glam, the history, one of the best restaurants in the whole country(Bock Bisztro, check it out), it's close to everything (esp. the 'OctogonOktogon' subway station) and it has a awesome spa. It was also the blue-print for the movie "Grand Budapest Hotel". If you give the staff notice, they'll pick you up from the train station in a limo (they did that for free for us), price . Price should be around $200/night, which I think is very reasonable for this place. I recommend a 3 night stay.

Budapest, with its Turkish history, has some 600+ spa's. There Here are two a couple that are noteworthy :

# the '''Kiraly Baths''', one of the oldest still existing bath houses in Budapest, see http://en.kiralyfurdo.hu/ . It's located across the river from the Parliament building# if you went with my hotel recommendation, you'll have one of the best private spas in the basement of your hotel.

This can be a day trip in itself, but it's on a steep hill, so use the funicular that starts at the '''Széchenyi Chain Bridge''' (literally a chain bridge) to get up there. After walking around up on the castle hill, perhaps paying a visit to the '''Torteneti Museum''' or the '''National Gallery''', make your way to the '''Fisherman's Bastion''' and the '''Mathias Church'''. There is a nice bar up thereat the bastion, have a drink and enjoy the view.

A large park on a steep hill overlooking Budapest. It's quite a hike to get up there, so if you're already spend from walking around all day, I'd recommend making a reservation for evening dinner at the '''CitadellaPanorama''' Restaurant up there, take a cab to get there an hour early, walk around a bit, and then have dinner at the '''CitadellaPanorama''' restaurant. Make sure to request a table by the window when making the reservation (you may have to make that reservation a day or two in advance), the view from there is unbeatable, and the food is excellent. '''NOTE:''' I just looked and it seems the '''Citadella Panorama''' restaurant is closed. I'm not sure if that's just for the winter or permanently, so please check with the hotel to find out (I'd be curious myself). However, the Citadella park on top of the Gellert Hill is still worth a visit, if just for the great view over Budapest. There were some other restaurants up there as well, but they're not the same quality. In this case, it's better to find something around "Andrassy'" street for a good dinner.

Vienna was once the capital of the largest state in Europe, and it shows: the downtown area is larger that Munich or Budapest. Although there is a good Metro ("U-Bahn") system, you're gonna be doing quite a bit of walking. With that in mind, it's a good idea to get a hotel that's close to the downtown area, but they can be quite expensive (or pretty crappy). One hotel I can recommend is the '''Hotel Beethoven''' (http://www.hotel-beethoven.at/en/) on the southern end of the downtown area, near the '''Naschmarkt'''. I'd recommend to stay for 3 nights, Vienna is big and you'll see places where you don't wanna rush.

[[File:vienna01.png|700px]|right|thumb]]It's pretty tough to find a starting point for something like Vienna, but a good place to start is at the south-western end of the downtown area, with the '''Hofburg'''(2), '''Heldenplatz''', '''Volksgarten'''(3), '''Parlament'''(4) and '''Rathaus'''(5) in the illustration. You can rent a horse-drawn carriage (called a "fiaker") to do this section of Vienna in style, and to save your feet. But you may still wanna come back later to take a look inside some of the places (at least the Hofburg) after the "fiaker" carriage ride. Afterwards, head to the '''Opera House''' (in the map at the far lower right corner, just cut off) and take a look inside (you won't get tickets here, that would be beyond lucky).  Then head up the '''Kaernter Strasse''' (the pedestrian mall) towards '''St. Stephens cathedral'''. Along the way you come by '''Hotel Sacher''', take a look at the pastries there (and their world famous cake - Sachertorte). Vienna is famous for it's old style Coffee-Houses with grand architecture. Along the way, try to spot some famous one's like '''Cafe Central''', '''Cafe Demel''' and '''Cafe Hawelka''', they're all around the downtown area near the '''Kaernter Strasse'''. But make sure to take a look inside '''St. Stephens cathedral''' once you made your way there. If you head further up north past the cathedral, you'll eventually will wind up at the '''Prater''', a very old amusement park with a big ferris wheel. If you ever seen the movie '''The Third Man''' with Orson Welles, this will look familiar. Take a loop with the ferris wheel to get a look across Vienna, and take a gander through the park. Turn around, and once you make your way back south through the '''Kaernter Strasse''' pedestrian area again (and walk around the side streets), past the southern end and past the Opera House is the '''Naschmarkt''', a culinary market with amazing foods from all over the world.  To the east from here, about a 3/4 mile walking thru old Vienna (or taking a cab), is '''Belvedere''', a huge complex made up of palaces, gardens and parks. Since you're there in spring, you'll see the gardens in full bloom. If the place looks familiar, it's because it starred in an endless number of movies as backdrop, including James Bond. And this is only a few pieces of downtown Vienna. I didn't put this into an actual step-by-step guide on purpose, since it depends somewhat on where you're staying. All in all, this will probably take the better part of a full day, if not two. ==== Schoenbrunn Palace ====A must-see, this is the equivalent of Versailles for Vienna. Take subway #4 ('''U4''') to the Schonbrunn station, and follow the signs (and the masses) towards the '''Schoenbrunn Palace'''. This will take the better part of a day. Walk up the hill to the '''Gloriette''' and have a coffee there while marveling at the gardens, fountains and palace below. After walking back down, make sure you get into the palace to see the Great Gallery and everything else there is to see, and spend a 1/2 a day wondering how it must have felt to be a king. ==== Zentralfriedhof (central cemetery) ====To get back to earth, you could take a trip to the Vienna central cemetery. This is not a joke, many famous people (Beethoven, Boltzmann, Schubert, Strauss, Brahms, Juergens, Falco, etc) are buried here and have real monuments here as their tomb stones. However, even though the name is "central cemetery", it's actually quite a bit outside of Vienna. You take the subway #6 ("U6") to "Zentralfriedhof, 2. Tor", and with some wandering around, will find quite a number of people whose names you know. Be warned: This place is '''HUGE'''. ==== Back to Vienna ====If you want to find some good restaurants and bars in Vienna, the area along the Danube channel has some good places. Walk (or take the subway) to "Schwedenplatz" (U1 or U4), and take a walk up the channel. However, the town has good places to eat and drink all over, it shouldn't be hard to find something good or even outstanding. Especially if you stay at the Hotel Beethoven, the '''Naschmarkt''' area right outside is fabulous. But since Vienna is also the city of music (Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms and many more all got their big break here), if you feel inclined to see a opera performance, try the '''Volksoper''', they typically aren't sold out years in advance as the opera house is. You can get there via the "U6" subway. If the place looks familiar, yes, this was also a location in a Bond movie...  == Moving on... ==Next stop is [[Prague and Dresden]], Prague being the medieval bohemian capital, and Dresden the capital of Saxony. To get to Prague from Vienna is pretty easy, there are again '''RailJet''' connections every two hours. The trip in those fast trains takes about 4 hours. If you get going early (around 7:00AM), you're in Prague before lunch. The best connection is probably the one at 9:00AM, which gets you to Prague at 1:00PM, at which time your hotel room there should be ready for you. There is food on the train, and it's not even bad. Since it's a long ride, you may wanna consider 1st class tickets to get a bit more room. At a minimum, you should make seat reservations, to ensure that you sit together. The train has plugs to charge your devices, and has also free Wifi.