Kristabella: Full of Snark Since 1977

Posted By Kristabella on October 14, 2013

*tap tap tap*

Is this thing on?

Oh, hey! I have a blog! Did you know? Because apparently I forgot! Until Blogher emailed me to tell me “hey, asshole, you haven’t posted in forever, we’re pulling your ads!” Which was fine, since I won’t miss those pennies I get every month. Especially since I’m not posting so no one is clicking! (That was actually months ago.)

BUT! I went to Europe! For the first time in my life! And I want to write about it! I know people aren’t the biggest fans of vacation recap posts, but I want to have a journal of my trip, so I’m posting it here. So there!

I was away for like 11 days. We planned to go to Munich for Oktoberfest and hit up some other countries nearby as our side trips before then. We decided on Budapest, Vienna and Prague. I’m probably going to post about each country, since that will be easiest.

The trip started with a big hiccup when our flight was delayed because of weather. I thought we’d be OK, since the weather gurus said the torrential rain we got on that Wednesday evening was only to be for an hour or two.

It wasn’t. It was a few hours of wind and rain and trees falling. So our 8:50 PM flight got pushed to 10:50.

We took this in stride. We were on vacation! And there are bars in the airport! And we were on vacation! So we drank all the wine and beer at the O’Hare Chili’s.

Our flight got even more delayed, but we finally boarded a bit before midnight. This was going to screw us on our connection in Munich for our flight to Budapest, but we had the gate agent in Chicago book us on the next flight to Budapest out of Munich, just in case. He told us we’d actually probably be OK, since Munich had a small airport and getting from our arrival gate to the departure gate would be like a five minute walk.

(HAHAHAHAHA. Chicago Lufthansa gate agent has apparently never been to the Munch airport which is NOT SMALL.)

My goal for the flight was to sleep as much as possible, since by the time we landed in Europe, it would be late afternoon the next day and we had plans to hit the ground running the minute we got to Budapest. No rest for the weary! And I really wanted to avoid jetlag.

Thankfully the 17 glasses of wine and 2 margaritas we had during our delay would only help with sleep. I also popped a leftover Norco from my appendix surgery (oh, hey! I had my appendix out in May! I should really blog more!) to knock me out for the nine hours I would spend cramped up in an airplane economy seat.

It worked, for the most part. The German lady next to me made the mistake of waking me up when they brought food, and then I growled at her and she never woke me up again.

The flight was hot. We were on the side with the sun and I have never been that hot on a plane in my life. It was miserable. I’m sure the German lady also didn’t like me for the snoring, farting and fidgeting I did through the flight.

But I slept. I woke up about an hour before we landed in Munich. It was enough time to get the breakfast they served, drink some water and watch an episode of The Cosby Show on the TV in my seat. (Dear Lufthansa, why only have one episode? I would have gladly had seasons and seasons of The Cosby Show to watch on my flight home! It would have been better than The Great Gatsby.)

We landed in Munich about 10 minutes before our original Budapest flight was supposed to take off. By the time we all got off the plane, we clearly weren’t going to make it. Thankfully the gate agent in Chicago booked us on the next flight, which was leaving in like 90 minutes.

We then proceeded to our Budapest gate. Which involved going through Customs and walking a mile. There was NO WAY we would have ever made that connection with less than 30 minutes to get to the gate. Way to go, Chicago gate agent.

We had to check in at the Lufthansa desk to get our new boarding passes. My friends Melissa and Alli got theirs just fine. Of course, they told me that I was on the waiting list and that I probably wouldn’t make that flight. And then the fact that I hadn’t showered or brushed my teeth in 24 hours really caught up to me and I made that poor woman get me on the flight. (It actually wasn’t a full flight, so I would have been fine. Still not sure what happened there. I think she was just dumb.)

There was just enough time to grab some food and some water before boarding our hour-long flight to Budapest. So we had paninis and warm Coke and used the free 30 minutes of wifi to check in before leaving Germany for Hungary.

We did not eat brats in a can. 

That flight was uneventful. It was short and I slept the whole time. It was a small plane and we had to board a bus to get off the plane and then it took us to baggage claim. We didn’t have to go through customs or anything, which I still think is kind of weird, but hey! We were there and had our bags!

The next stop was the ATM. We had smartly arranged for a car service to take us to the hotel. (Seriously, who wants to deal with public transit after flying forever?) We needed to have some Hungarian money for the tip and just in general for our time Budapest. The exchange rate is like 200 Hungarian forints to US dollars. Which means, if you take out $100 from the ATM, it’s like 20,000 forints. I was convinced I was taking out too much. TWENTY THOUSAND IS A LOT. But, not really.

We found our driver and then we were on our way to the hotel! Note to anyone who travels to Budapest, they are crazy drivers. I thought we were going to crash more than once. But our driver was really nice and he spoke a little English and I even wowed him with my Spanish-speaking abilities. (Not really, I basically just told him I only spoke a little Spanish when he asked.)

Next up, our time in Budapest, including sampling the native drink that really knocks you on your ass!

Buda! We made it!

Categories: A Day in the Life of Me, Europe 2013, Travel
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