2023 Buda to Bucha Day 01 Travel Day!

By travelerdon on November 12, 2023

Oct 3 & 4, 2023 Travel Days!

We arise today excited for our newest adventure! We zip up our bags that were mostly packed last night. Just the final essentials to put in and we/re ready to go! Our shuttle driver arrives on time. All is good. We are traveling with full size Check In Luggage this time for laundry mid trip will be expensive and unpredictable. I entertain myself by photographing Southern California from the plane window.

And then a few shots as we land in Atlanta!

Our first flight leaves LAX on time, however, we are informed there will be a delay in Atlanta to go to Amsterdam. (Atlanta has been one of our troublesome airports in the past and has lost our luggage) We attempt to try and rebook our third flight but we are assured the time will be made up in the air. We have been gullible in the past and we wonder if we’ll be caught again! So we board and the first leg of the trip is not only uneventful, but very comfortable! It didn’t hurt that we paid for “Comfort+”! Roomy leg room, Front of the plane, etc. Food is plentiful, yet a bit tasteless. (Can’t win them all!) So we land with high expectations. (Did I really say that?)

As informed in Los Angeles, the flight from Atlanta to Amsterdam is delayed 40 minutes. Did I say 40 minutes? That is airport speak for one hour (if you’re lucky!). Now considering that we only are allotted 1.5 hours in Amsterdam, this will be cutting things a bit close! But we landed in Atlanta 30 minutes early so a 5 hour flight CAN be done in 4.5 hours, right? So that translates to an 8 hour flight being done in less time, doesn’t it? All is good, we say!

Why do I sound like the doomsday predictor? Get a life Don and suck it up! Stop this naysaying! Everything is good so far! We even see the flight crew walk past us and we suggest they ‘Step on the gas!’ They tell us it will be no problem! So calm down! We’ve got this! The Equipment (Plane) finally arrives and it’s taking an exorbitant amount of time for the cleaning crews to finish their job before we can board. Someone suggests that likely someone got sick on the plane and they had to spend extra time cleaning it! Sounds reasonable!

So we finally board the plane and we are off! Into the wild blue yonder! I watch a movie. Then it gets dark. I put on the complimentary blindfold that comes in the Comfort+ Package (along with toothbrush and toothpaste!) and lay back for a much needed nap! Rest comes my way but never in the form of actual sleep. But an hour or two of much needed rest in the middle of the night is welcomed! But anyone who has ever said that the comfort of an airline seat can induce sleep and slumber is quite a bit mistaken! So, after a couple hours of restless sleep and I am awake again! Another movie. And another. I should probably be picking movies that are boring and will put me to sleep. But not me! I like stimulating movies that challenge the senses!

Then Sunrise appears out the window! The angle from my window isn’t perfect but the deep blue sky dropping down the the glowing orange sunrise followed down by the deep blue sea is fun to watch. Pausing the movie to admire Mother Nature’s display over the Northern Oceans keeps my mind active and my senses full! So much for sleep! We have an uneventful landing in Schiphol (pronounced Shih-pole) Airport.

Now that we have touched down, we taxi for what seems forever! We taxi and I look out and the Control Tower looks miles away! In fact, it is! We have landed on Schiphol’s “Polderbaan” Runway! It is literally 3 freaking miles from the terminals! Look it up!!! And at the speed that a jet taxies, it takes us about 50 minutes to taxi to the terminals! Now I have to give credit to our pilots for landing us 20 minutes ahead of (our delayed) schedule! Oh right, that leaves 30 minutes of taxing left to our schedule!

Needless to say, all of the foreboding I have taken to and the foreshadowing that I have alluded to here come true. We remember the Schiphol Airport from our first encounter 11 years ago but it has changed. And not in a good way! This once tiny airport has blossomed into one of the largest airports we have ever encountered! Comparable to Chicago’s Midway or Philadelphia’s International Airport. Travel through them and you’ll know what I mean! We had to walk about 2 miles to only find out that we had missed our 3rd flight! But an attendant was there waiting for us, saying there were 10 more, making it 12 people that missed it. What happened to the good old days that when an airline KNEW people were coming, they would hold the flight for 10-15 minutes???

The plane was right there in plain (pun intended) sight but they had pulled the gate a couple feet away from it and they said the ‘Paperwork’ was already delivered to the plane! But, in the airlines defense, the attendant walked with us back to the point (One mile back!) and helped us rebook our flight 3 hours later!

Now I have to say, at this point, that we had been already traveling for 21 hours with little to no sleep. Miles of walking (I guess we got our steps in!) we were a couple of tired campers! But hey, wait! There’s a restaurant that serves booze AND food! So we manage to spend an hour there. Slightly refreshed, we head for our new Terminal (another mile away!) and we sit and wait, (almost comatose) and our new flight is also delayed almost 40 more minutes! But we hang in there and finally board the final leg from Amsterdam to Budapest!

Elee clears the line and gets seated next to a young lady who is very conversational (to her benefit, considering her exhaustion level!) but I get flagged (Oh great! What now???) and I’m told my seat has been changed. But the good news they tell me is I have an empty row and have 3 seats to myself! Looking forward to this arrangement, i get on board the plane and find I have been assigned to an overwing exit row (that doesn’t have reclining seats) and I actually look forward to it! The plane takes off and I strap myself into the middle of 3 seats and lay down across the 3 seats, not really comfortable, but doable! I close my eyes and try to sleep, fitfully and somewhat unsuccessful for sleep but I get some rest!

We land and I sit up. We have an uneventful time retrieving our luggage (which has actually followed us this time!) and we arrange for a van to take us to our apartment. We chat amicably with the others in the van and finally arrive at our apartment. We have only 10 minutes of difficulty arranging to get into the 2 bedroom apartment and we drop our luggage and grab our cameras and head out in search of dinner and adventure! We buy a few bottles of much desired bottled water at a small grocery store and find a Hungarian Bistro and indulge in Hungarian Ratatouille!

We then drop off our heavy water purchases at our apartment and take our cameras down by the river for some night photos! The sights are fantastic and the Parliament building is fun to photograph at night!

Until tomorrow Peeps!