Preparing for Fancy's October Break

Cross it off the bucket list.

Cinque Terre has quickly become a must-see travel destination, and while I don't mind being labeled as a "travel person" I've been embarrassed to say that I’ve never visited. 

Seeing pictures like this from a friend's honeymoon in Cinque Terre was all of the inspiration we needed...

As Fancy and I discussed our options for the week-long October Break (and the continuation of my birthday month), Italy and Cinque Terre rose to the top.

We flirted with a few other European destinations that were further south (and hopefully warmer) but ultimately decided to take advantage of the cheap flight to Milan ($120/round trip).

Cinque Terre was a must-see and Fancy suggested the idea of adding Lake Como.  The only thing I knew about Lake Como is probably what most people know — George Clooney has a house there.

(Not George Clooney's house.)

Even though there are numerous towns on the lake, the entire 'Lake Como' region claims Mr. Clooney as a resident. While looking through one of the local Como magazines we came across an article essentially recounting “An evening with Clooney” from 2008 with all of the old pictures and how guests ‘experienced Clooney’ over six years ago — this was the October 2014 cover story!

It was tough decision to decide where to stay because there are a myriad of great options for both regions -- Cinque Terre actually has five villages (for those who know Italian).  

Based on some recommendations, we decided on the town of Varenna in Lake Como because we heard the mid-lakes area is the most beautiful (FACT!) and Vernazza in Cinque Terre because it's known as the most picturesque of the five villages (I AGREE!). The combination of Varenna + Vernazza led to some confusion when making travel plans, but both of the "V" towns surpassed all of our expectations!

PART ONE: Cinque Terre -- Three soul-filling nights

PART TWO: Airbnbing Lake Como -- Northern Italy’s best

Tihany, Hungary (Lake Balaton) -- Surprise Birthday Getaway (2 of 4)

The week had been long.
Birthday "months" are not a game for the weak of heart.
After enjoying the Part One of my birthday month, it took a few days to recover and get our wits about us.

Also, somehow we had scheduled dinners or some form of social gathering on Monday evening, Tuesday evening, Wednesday evening and Thursday evening of the following week.

To further contribute to the week's event, I was temporarily ending my mini-retirement, and was substitute teaching at Fancy's school on Thursday and Friday.  I gained a new appreciate for Fancy coming home from school tired.  For the record, you can call me Coach Perzel -- High School PE teacher.  It was a lot of fun to spend time at the school, interact with some of the students and see where Fancy spends all of her time.

"How do you feel about getting away for the weekend?"

Fancy proposed this question while we were sitting at her desk on Friday afternoon after school had ended. She had just returned from a field trip into Budapest with the entire 6th grade and I was glad to see her, since she has been my go-to question answerer when I need to ask about something student-related (which was often).  Apparently, students like to take advantage of substitute teachers.

As a neighboring teacher walked by in the hallway, he overhead us talking about visiting Lake Balaton. If we were to visit, he suggested the village of Tihany. Just like that, it was decided.  We booked a small little apartment/home for 30Euro/night within 15 minutes.  We didn't know much about the town, and had never been to Lake Balaton before, but we'd heard the rumors and praises from it's multitude of fans.

















It seems to be one of the only (and best) summer get-away spots in the country.  It's a large lake west of Budapest (random fact: the small Mediterranean island of Malta can fit inside of it).  The lake is dotted with small towns and villages along the edge.



In general, Fancy and I really enjoy visiting the smaller towns in the countryside.  There's something calming and relaxing about getting outside the city, especially Budapest.

The journey to the lake started early Saturday on a train that absolutely was leftover from the Communist era.  Even the local Hungarians were bashing the quality (and lack thereof) of the train.  We learned that Hungary actually has two sets of trains -- the updated trains that are used during the summer, busy months, and the poor, worn, leftover trains apparently used during the less-busy seasons.  Guess which one we got?

 Let's just say we were very nervous when we discovered we had mistakenly sat in the first class seats of the train.  If this is what first class looks like (it left a lot to be desired) how bad is second-class going to be?

Broken windows?
Sitting on the ground?
Will we have to stand (my constant fear!)?



It turns out it's exactly like first class, maybe without as frequent cleaning. Needless to say, we wouldn't be arriving in Tihany in luxury.

However, as soon as the train departed from the station, it immediately reminded us of the relaxing, hypnotic trance of riding a train that we both love.

Fancy did not apply the graffiti artwork.

When we finally arrived in Tihany we were all smiles.  The first thing I noticed was the brilliant blue of the lake.  From Georgia, we are accustomed to the murky green color of lakes.  It gets the job done, but doesn't impress you. This lake was very impressive. Secondly, the air quality was noticeably improved from the city.  I've always considered people telling about air quality a little hocus pocus, but now I'm a believer. I'm not sure if it's simply the air quality in Budapest is truly poor or if I'm getting older and appreciate good air.

To me, Tihany is a little paradise of a village.  It recently underwent a complete town renovation.  It was much needed because the village had not undergone any major construction since the 1960s.  Here's an interesting article about the town and apparently we might have been staying near Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie: http://welovebalaton.hu/balaton/why.is.tihany.europe.s.coolest.village

We spent the day exploring the small village which didn't take very long, but was extremely memorable and picturesque.  The town's claims-to-fame are it's lavender, paprika and elevated-location overlooking the lake.  Behind the village, there was a very small lake/pond situation that we quickly dubbed "the lake within the lake".  From the dock, we sat with a bottle of wine and while the bell tolls rang from the baroque church above, we enjoyed one of the most memorable sunsets I've every experienced.  32 is feeling good.

Here's how they keep the bus schedule in Eastern Europe.

This qualifies as a lot of Paprika -- a Hungarian treasure.

Of course, the first thing I wanted to do was eat.  The view of our lunch was satisfactory.

The abbey that sits atop Tihany.

Finding Rege Cafe was difficult but the view...

Discovering our "lake within the lake".

Fancy never passes up an opportunity to project her shadow on a 150-year abbey -- swell of a good time.

At breakfast, we were literally the only other people besides one large group sitting at the same table.  We whispered to each other, it was awkward, but the breakfast was great!

BeerBike and EscapeRoom -- (1 of 4) The Birthday Month in Budapest.

As some of you may know about me, I've adopted the "birthday month" to celebrate my birthday, instead of settling for a single day, or even cramming it into a weekend.

For that matter, I strongly encourage each of you to do the same and let me tell you why.

My birthday is on the 11th of October.  This means I have a solid ten days of building up anticipation for the birthday in October.  It gives you just a few more opportunities to get 'your way' in the inevitable domestic "conversations", I get to select 'my' restaurant when dining and listen to 'my' music at home.  I'd really be short-changing myself if I only celebrated my birthday for a day.

Because several of our new school friends were going to be out of the city for my birthday weekend (they are lucky we are still friends), we decided to celebrate together the weekend before my actual birthday.  Since we really celebrate the entire month, it made perfect sense to begin the month celebration.

When Fancy asked what I wanted to do or get for my birthday, I immediately ran through the catalogue of Budapest experiences I wanted to try.  I've learned about myself that I tend to find experiences much more rewarding than any gift, especially enjoyed with friends.  This is not to say it would be too late to send a gift.  Mail in Hungary works perfectly well...if you're curious...

Todd Perzel
ATTN: Todd's Birthday Month
Hajos Utca 31, 1/1
1065 Budapest
Hungary

But I digress...

There were two unique experiences that I knew I wanted to try -- The Budapest BeerBike and an EscapeRoom.

(1) The Budapest Beer Bike

Imagine riding in a carriage with 12 of your closest friends, but you must pedal like a bicycle to move the carriage.  You get to navigate some Budapest's most famous streets and landmarks, all while being served unlimited draft beer from one of your friends (that is now a bartender). He or she pumps and serves for the following three hours because it's important to stay hydrated. 

This old guy just biked right up to the BeerBike and demanded a beer.  Here's a beer for your boldness, sir.

This has nothing to do with our BeerBike but it was the largest Limo in the history of limos.

What do 4 Americans, 2 Canadians and 1 Spaniard have in common?

Todd's Birthday Month Celebration.

Up, up and away at Hero's Square.

At this point, we were turning into "those people".

A bottle of Hungarian Palinka has appeared.

More beer giveaway!

"I'll give you one, because you're sweet old ladies and my grandmother would expect me to be generous."

(2) The second experience was a  Budapest Escape Room.

A growing trend across Europe that began in Budapest is an hour-long "Escape Room" puzzle.  There's over 20 different Escape Rooms across the city and growing in popularity each year.  It's explained: 

Real-life room escape games are a type of physical adventure game in which people are locked in a room with other participants and have to use elements of the room to solve a series of puzzles, find clues, and escape the room within a set time limit (60 minute).

It was really fun and an experience I highly recommend in Budapest.  However, I don't recommend completing an Escape Room after three hours on a BeerBike - it leads to some fuzzy thinking and lack of overall cognitive ability, as you'd imagine.

For those that are keeping score for the night, we were able to divide into two rooms -- boys vs. girls.  The guys had a room called "Madness" and the girls had a room called "Mirrors".  The girls said they won because they escaped the room with 4-minutes of the 60 remaining.  I say that we we won because we stayed in the room for the entire 60-minutes withgout escaping (obviously, getting our full 60-minutes worth of value where the girls 'wasted' 4 minutes).  Since it was my birthday weekend, the guys were deemed champions.  Plus, our room was much more difficult to solve.

Hungarian Banking Fun

There are certain events in life that once we complete, we never wish to repeat.

That rhymes, and it’s also true.

Things that come to mind: 8am classes in college, eating a fish sandwich at McDonalds, trying ‘criadillas’ in Spain.

Until Tuesday, I would have said this was a pretty well-rounded list.  However, please allow me to add one more event — opening a Hungarian bank account.

As I've entered into my 30s, I've begun view ‘time’ as a much more valuable resource.  Unfortunately, this deep profound philosophy of Todd isn’t shared by the Hungarian banking system.  In fact, the festivities would last two days.

The Hungarian banking system feels like ‘death by papercuts’.

Not only to your patience, but also to your bank account balance, itself.  Fancy visited the bank on Monday and was able to open a bank account in her name, only after about an hour and half of applications, paperwork, initials, stamps, oh, lots of stamps, any many signatures.  This was accomplished only due to having a pre-assigned appointment, arranged by the school.  However, in order to add me (obviously I will be contributing significantly to our Hungarian bank account) we got greedy and showed up to a local bank without an appointment.  I got to experience and witness the complexity that is Hungarian banking system.

Since we have been removed from Budapest and we are living in a small village, we were commuting by bus.  If you can decipher the Hungarian bus schedule (in Hungarian) I don't think there's much in this world that you can't do.

We arrived at the bank and after pulling our number ticket at the front we were forced to wait for the only English speaking teller.  Our number was called, but only to greeted by a nice enough fellow that wasn't able to communicate in our broken Hungarian (I'm being generous).  We continued to wait another 15 minutes for Krisztina.

Bless this nice lady -- she’s had one appointment after another all week because she cursed herself by learning English.  Now, she is stuck assisting with each and every new teacher opening an account.  After we wait another 15 minutes, we observe she is wrapping up her previous appointment with another set of teachers from the school.  Without our number being called, we slide into the two seats in front of her desk; Budapest is no place for the meek and timid.

It starts innocently enough, “We’d like to add me to the account”.

Friendly enough, she turns to her computer, starts punching away.  Now, she seems pretty competent and surprising efficient.  She swiftly bounces between her desk and the printer, repeatedly printing documents, explaining documents, asking for signatures.  This occurred at least 12 times.  Her speed and efficiency confused us: I look down at my watch and it’s already been an hour and half.  Yes, I may have interjected with a question or five, but I’ve always said since I was young, “You better know your Hungarian bank account like the back of your hand”.

Let me just start by saying that the entire concept of “Free Checking” is non-existent.  Absolutely non-existent.  In fact, it’s completely the opposite.  The banks have actually made it normal to charge their customers for almost everything.  I don't intend to bash the banking system, but only to shed some light on the nuances of having a bank account in Budapest.  I will stop short of Venn Diagramming this situation, but I did compile a list of some of the more notable differences in banking.  But, as our house host explained in a moment of deep profoundness “we are all here for weird” — meaning, we all find pleasure in the fact that things are different from back home and that novelty is what keeps life interesting.

By Nancy’s school, we are required to have two bank account within the same bank.  One account is in the denomination of USD$ and another account in the local currency Hungarian forint (HUF).  Since Fancy is paid in US$ we are responsible for transferring all funds to the local currency.

Harmless enough.

Except there are fees for each transfer, of course.  We would quickly learn this pattern repeat itself in Hungarian banking.

Loads of paperwork.

Here are some rules and observations on the Hungarian banking system:

-Any cash withdrawal must occur at an ATM
-There are zero face-to-face withdrawal centers that we know.

-Until a couple months, Hungary offered no free way to withdrawal cash…the bank has your money and would charge you each and every time you make a withdrawal.  Recent legislation finally allow citizens the “right” to withdrawal cash twice per month for free.

-Debit transactions are free (the only thing)

-Fancy’s debit card costs $28

-My debit card (additionally) costs $40

-Annual fee $12

-Every bank-to-bank transfer incurs a fee

-Pretty much everything incurs a fee

Accessing our account online will be an entirely separately post because it deserves that much space, however it has included downloading two different browsers for our laptop, one smartphone app, getting a unique password each and every time, and creating new passwords each and every time we login to the account.

We love Hungarian banking. 

I was heart-broken my video was deleted of her stamping each and every page of these packets.  It was a hypnotizing trance of stamps.  She literally had to create, print, sign and stamp each and every page of these documents.  It was impressive to witness.