Tonight we are checked into the Four Seasons Hotel Budapest. It has been a long day. The Turkish Airline flight left IAH at 9:00 pm on Thursday. We had good seats in Business Class. The seats reclined completely so we were able to get some sleep. Gavin said he slept well. I maybe got a couple of hours. The staff on the Boeing 777 must have been in excess of 20 people. They really made a big deal of dinner, a four course meal. We both had the filet mignon. It was midnight before we were able to flatten out our seats. They even made up each seat/bed for us. Too much food and wine. They woke us a couple of hours before we landed and fed us a hot breakfast.
We arrived in Istanbul right on schedule, 5:30 pm local time, 8:30 am Houston time. We had no problems getting off the plane and headed straight for the gate for the short flight from Istanbul to Budapest. Well, the only problem we had was when I asked Gavin if he had his passport. He said that he did not have his passport. I spent the next 10 minutes frantically searching through my bag for his passport. I finally asked him again if he was sure he did not have his passport. He finally woke up and said that he did.
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| Gavin in Istanbul airport |
The flight from Istanbul to Budapest was a two hour flight. We departed at 7:00 pm and arrived in Budapest at 7:00 pm (two time zones difference). Again, we were in Business Class and again, they tried to wine and dine us to death. We had no problems getting through Immigration or Customs and met our Golden Eagle represenative (Geroge) who arranged the 30 minute drive to the hotel.
The tour hosted a dinner starting at 7:30 pm. We did not get to our room until 8:30 pm so we decided to forgo the dinner, looked around the hotel a bit and then went out for a quick walk.
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| Hotel Lobby |
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| Hotel Lobby |
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| Hotel Lobby |
It was very chilly with a stiff breeze. I took Gavin over the Vorosmarty Square which was decorated for Christmas and to show him where the Hard Rock Cafe was located.
Gavin got all his shopping done for the family at the Hard Rock.
We got back to the hotel and had an information package give to us and got a call from Andrea, the tour director. She invited us down to the lobby and we told her we would just meet her in the morning.
The Four Seasons lobby is very impressive compared to the Intercontinental. Good to see that Gavin finally got his Hard Rock Budapest t-shirt.
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