Sunday, September 27, 2015
Clay was up first again and he woke me up about 6:45am with
the light from his tablet in bed. Today
we have breakfast and pack up, check out and leave Croatia. We were later to
breakfast and had a 2-top so it was more relaxed dining this morning. Though
these tour hotel’s buffet breakfasts are never too pleasant. Anyway, we weren’t
rushed. We were downstairs and checked out and had checked with the guy at the
front desk whose name we never did get by 9:40am. Clay tipped him and thanked
him again. Valentino seemed like he was going to offer to drive us himself last
night when we got the bus mileage from him. Too bad we didn’t ask him first. I
guess he didn’t learn that we needed a ride to Budapest until the last night.
We’d have been happier giving him 400 Euros than someone we didn’t know. But,
anyway the unknown front desk guy came through for us in 2 minutes work what we
had waited 10 days to hear without ever getting a reply, so good work. Radomir
arrived by 9:45am and was ready to go. Since we had just gotten comfortable in
the lobby, we were ready to go too. Radomir had a nice 4 door Mercedes and we
were comfortable. He had stocked the back seat with water, 4 bananas, 2 snack
bars and some candies. We drank one of the waters, ate all the snacks except
the bananas and he insisted we take those with us when he dropped us off. The
ride went quickly. We saw miles and miles of corn fields and had several views of a giant Hungarian lake. It was about 3 hours total. Both the train or bus would have
taken closer to 5 hours so this was pretty painless except for the price
difference. I think it was so quick because there was virtually no traffic on
the road until we reached Budapest. There is a big modern highway, the E71
between Zagreb and Budapest and we just about had it to ourselves. Unlike the
other border checkpoints we have been through on this trip, there was no line
at this one. We were the only vehicle from Croatia to Hungary while we were
there and we only saw 3 cars come through from the other direction. Both
countries’ checkpoints were back to back again and after Croatia’s border guard
stamped the passports, he handed them across to the woman in Hungary’s
checkpoint where she stamped them. They both checked documents thoroughly but
quickly. There were a lot of border guards from either side standing around so
clearly this was unusually light traffic or they were expecting something to
happen. Once on the Hungarian side, Radomir stopped on the side of the road and
parked and told us he had to go to a stand across the street and get a highway
permit for Hungary. He came back and showed it and said it cost 10 Euros and
was good for 7 days, as I recall. While he was over there, I noticed the armed
soldier standing by what must have been at least 2 dozen empty buses. I guess
Hungary was expected a lot of people to arrive soon! Fortunately, we didn’t see
any trouble getting here or since we arrived. Radomir dropped us off at the Royal
Park Boutique Hotel at Nrfelejcs utca 6 about a half block from Keleti
Palyaudvar (the main train station). We picked this place because it is
convenient to the train station and the price was good. If we’d known we weren’t
taking the train, I don’t know if we’d have stayed here. The good news is that
it is clean, quiet, modern and well maintained. We paid 376 Euros for 4 nights
and it includes breakfast and free wifi. So far I have no complaints at this
price. We needed to do laundry and that was what we did the rest of the day. We
asked at the front desk and she gave us a map and marked the hotel and the approximate
location of the self-serve laundry. She told us where to go to buy Metro
tickets and to take the red line 1 stop and the walk about 2 blocks. She was
right, but we wouldn’t have found it without the street address for which we
thank Clay’s phone! We paid 3200 Hungarian Forints to wash and dry 2 loads.
That equaled $12. It was all good except the dryers were set to no go above 30C
max so we would still be there waiting for the jeans to dry! The jeans were the
only thing we can’t really hand wash for the same reason so we aren’t sure what
to do about this in 2 more weeks. For example, the laundry list in this room
says 1 pair of jeans can be sent out for 2300 HUF, so I have 3 pairs of jeans
with me and the longest I can wear a pair is 1 week which means every 2 weeks I
need to launder them. If the Amadeus ships have any laundry service on board
for similar prices then it makes sense to hand launder every night and always
have something hanging up to dry but send the jeans out. We’ll have to see. I wasn’t hungry and it was drizzling when we
headed back to the hotel. So I started distributing our damp laundry and Clay
went out to one of the dozens of kabob and gyros stands we had passed. I ate a
banana and some of the big bag of dry roasted peanuts Clay bought at Lake Bled
with a cup of in-room Nespresso decaf. I took my pills and worked on this
entry. Now Clay is snoring in bed and I need to join him, in bed, not in
snoring, I hope not…
Anyway, we are on our own until we join Amadeus Silver II
for our 28-day Complete Europe. According to Marine Traffic, Amadeus Silver II
is on her way south so we have high hopes of finally cruising most of the Danube. Yesterday she was in Linz and today she is in Vienna so as long as she keeps moving along, she should be here to pick us up! If you know our history of arriving to river cruise and the boat not being there then you will know how happy this will make us!
Clay said he didn’t take any photos he wanted to post today.
