Awoke with the alarm at 7:30, and reluctantly got up, and ready, then went to breakfast. We walked to the tomb of Gül Baba, where the overseer refused to charge us the adult rate and sold us two student tickets. The tomb was small but beautiful, surrounded by roses and with a broad view of the city.
We meandered down the hill to the Margaret bridge. This time we took the tram across. At the other side, we took another tram down to Jess' office so she could email some files around. Whee. At least the tram went along the Danube so there were pretty views.
We then hopped in the subway and went to the Great Synagogue, again. The temple was built so as to appeal to people of all creeds. The outside is has minarets and is decorated with Moorish stars. The inside is laid out like a Christian church or mosque, down to the (decorative) pulpits and (functional) organ. During services, they bring in some gentiles to play the organ and sing along with the rabbi. Opinions on this are mixed. Inside and out, the temple is quite beautiful, if not particularly Jewish-looking. Our guide (being gentiles, we decided to take the tour) then took us out to the garden, where we saw the mass graves of 10,000 Jews who couldn't be buried in the Jewish cemetary during WWII. We also saw the Emmanuel tree, a metal weeping willow commemorating Holocaust victims, as well as a monument to Raoul Wallenberg and the other non-Jews recognized for saving Jews from the Nazis. It was very poignant.
After leaving the synagogue, we headed to the jewelry store where Jess and the random cyclist had nearly collided on Sunday. They had many lovely items. We selected an art nouveau-ish opal necklace for Jess.
We wandered around the area a bit looking for a place for lunch. After passing up many options, we eventually settled on a lovely Hungarian-Mediterranian-Indian palace called Darshan. Jess ordered her standard tomato salad (Hungary has great tomatoes) and steak fries with ewe cheese and yoghurt. The fries were wonderfully spiced and delicious, and Jer didn't steal nearly as many of them as he wished he could. Jer has a rich game broth, salad with yoghurt dressing, and toast with tsatziki. The steak fries were certainly wonderful, Jer was not able to determine if the rest was excellent, or if fresh vegetables, clearly expressed, were just such a welcome change that we were overwhelmed with gratitude. In any case, we enjoyed it all. We sat and sipped tea and took turns writing postcards for a while after lunch.
We left the restaurant in search of the SzabadsÁg bridge and the Gellert Spa. Along the way, we stopped at the Central Market Hall, where Jer bought inexpensive saffron and paprika, and we marveled at the giant peppers and leeks.
We weren't set on more thermal baths, but we did want to see the marble pool room at the Gellert Spa. With much difficulty (Hungarian spas seem to be universally incomprehensible) we managed to gain access. Jer managed to ger both a towel and (ugly) bathing trunks, Jess was not able to acquire a towel (again), as the (surly) towel people had run out of change. Eventually we made our way to the pools, which was lovely, if small and somewhat crowded. After a leisurely soak (and the loan of a towel by a nice German lady, in Jess's case), we headed out. We stopped by the cave church, built into the rock across the street from the Gellert Baths. It was lovely, with a live organist playing a small electric organ (she glared at Jer when his camera made shutter noises. So he turned its sound off.) Along the way back toward central Budapest we watched a nice lady feed over a dozen feral cats, and we stopped at the Gellert waterfall. Jer climbed partway up the hill to the St. Gellert statue (which Jess had visited her first day, so she waited at the bottom).
After some initial confusion, we caught a tram along the river to [url=http://www.vendegvaro.hu/37-2130]HorgÁsztanya Vendéglö, a fish restaurant our B&B proprietor had recommended. Happily, they had fogas, a fish from Lake Balaton universally translated as "pike-perch", which we ordered in a mushroom sauce. It was delightful, as was the trout with dilly-garlic butter, shopksa salad (tomatoes, cukes, onion and olives, yum) and mashed potatoes. The only problem was the smoke - we weren't able to get an outdoor table, and some big guy lit a stogie at the next table. Ugh.
We wandered up the street to yet another pastry shop, Angelika CukrÁszda, which is open until midnight (which is unusually late for Budapest). Jer had a caipirinha, which was strong but otherwise not very good, and a puff pastry filled with whipped cream and topped with almonds, which was quite tasty. Jess had a hot chocolate (the waitress asked "white or black?" and it took a moment for us to figure out that she meant the chocolate in the drink) and a slice of Sacher torta, which was a little dense but yummy. We had a leisurely dessert while lounging on the Angelika's sofas, listening to international pop music and finishing up our postcards.
Then it was time to go back to our B&B, get packed and head to bed.