Sophmore students of Civil Engineering School eagerly awaited the end of May this year. You may wonder why but the answer is simple. It was the end of May that we finally set off to our three-day excursion. We went to one of the most beautiful European cities, former imperial capital known, among other things, for its bridges. Can you guess which city it is? Yes, it’s Budapest, the beautiful capital of Hungary.

     The trip started at 8.00 am when we hit the road and started driving towards Balaton. However, there were some issues with a bus and vignette so our grumpy tour guide decided that we would skip the visit to Balaton and sightseeing in Pest. After ten long hours of driving, we finally got to the hotel around 18.20 but at 19.30 we all had to be ready for dinner. As you can imagine, all the girls were flabbergasted with that amount of time to get ready, especially those girls that were staying in three-bed rooms! Anyway, to our big surprise, we managed to get ready in time and we headed for dinner. Dinner took place in a typically Hungarian type of a restaurant called “čarda”; it was great and it was accompanied by the gypsy performance which was really fun.

                                                  

After dinner we took a nice walk around the town and admired bridges we were passing by. We got back to the hotel by metro which was a new and fun experience for most students but we concluded it wasn’t such a big deal. Back at the hotel we split up in a couple of rooms to hang out with each other; a lot of new friendships were made on this trip and we also got to know each other better which helped us realize how many amazing people we are surrounded by.

The second day, or you can call it a chaotic day, began. Three girls had left their shoes on the balcony the night before so when they woke up in the morning their shoes were dripping wet and the rest of us woke up because we heard them running from room to room trying to find someone who would borrow them shoes. In addition, everyone was tired and our guides “tortured us” with sightseeing. First we visited Heroes’ Square and then we went for a very very long walk in Budapest’s old town during which we saw many historic buildings and learnt a lot about Hungarian history.

 

After that we had some free time, which was just what we needed. We used that time to get somethng to eat, to buy some souvenirs, and of course, to rest a bit. Our next stop was the House of Terror Museum. It’s a museum about terror, both German terror against the Jews in World War ll and the Communist terror against Hungarian people. Sounds fun, right? Yes, but not if you’re falling off your feet.

                                                          

Moving on, we once again had very little time to get ready for dinner on a boat that sails on the Danube. In all honesty, that was beautiful and we believe everyone loved it, especially because of the Parliament building, truly the most beautiful building in the whole of Budapest.

Later on we also took a walk around the parliament building which was genuinely breathtaking. And we also must mention here that the dinner we had on the sail boat was delicious.

That night we took another walk, far less pleasant, along the Danube bank to a visit a memorial to Hungarian Jews that were shot there during the holocaust and thrown into the Danube.

 

And just like that the third day got going. We all got out of bed early and packed since we had to leave for the water park. The water park is on the outskirts of the city, we had three hours of free time there which some students used to finally get some rest (laying under sunshades, sipping cold coke or just dozing off), while some students swam in indoor and outdoor pools. Afterwards we headed for our final stop, the Balaton Lake. Balaton is the biggest lake in Central Europe that the Hungarians consider their sea. It’s very nice, there’s a lot of nature and the air is fresh, and you can also see many swans. It’s a very picturesque place to see and take some selfies for Instagram, which we, of course, did do.

 

Unfortunately, all good things come to an end, so after visiting Balaton, it was time to  start our drive back home which was exhausting but fun. We all liked Budapest (except for the too much walking part) and we can all agree that it’s an amazing city, but to see it in all its beauty, you need much more time than we had. When we go on a class trip, usually it’s the bus rides that leave the best impressions on us but this time it was hanging out in each others’ rooms. We can finish this text by concluding that the trip was overall pleasant and it was worth the money and tiredness.

Written and photographed by: Larissa Ribarić and Katia Butorac (class 2 AT)

Edited by: Sanja Bura, May 2024