Pepper Wigs & Tourist Traps

Thursday was hang out day to collect our wits, energy, health, sleep, laundry and artwork. It's amazing how much an artist can sprawl in a few days' time...imagine what a whole team of artists living together can do!

With one more visit to the Pataki bakery for pastries and internet, we finalized travel arrangements, made a skype call (you had to see Marcia showing off the pastry case to Marge via Skype, and the patrons'/employees' reactions!), and walk it all off on the way back up the hill.

Friday we saved for a last visit into Budapest, a full and totally tourist day, no obligations. It was Friday when I began to really fall in love with this great city.

We started in the International Market, an architectural delight which we nevertheless deemed a disappointing tourist trap worthy only of a few good photos. A ground floor greeter, sporting a wig made of hot peppers, welcomed us into the fray of food vendors and shoppers, with arts and crafts and fast Hungarian food on the upper level, crammed with patrons of every nationality.

I'm glad I went, but don't need to go again!

Proceeding down Vaci Utca, we discovered the more upscale tourist traps, with hefty price tags and aggressive sales people, but it was a lovely stroll anyway, up a pedestrian walkway, and Linda and I emerged with new rings:

It was time to escape the tourist traps and discover Budapest's Great Synagogue...