Viaje - Budapest

Well, I am now in Budapest, the 6th city of the 10 that I am traveling to. This is day13 of my trip and I have just about 2 more weeks left. As you can see from the numbers above, I am spending more time in the cities at the end of the trip. The first couple cities I basically just spent 2 nights and about a day and a half in, but Prague, Budapest, and the others following Budapest I am spending 3 nights and 2 whole days in!! I have found that I can take things much slower when I have 2 full days because I'm pretty good about seeing all of the sights very quickly... in half a day usually. So, this is why I have the time to write on here today! About the weather, it has definitely been colder in all of the cities I've been to than Barcelona, but I knew to expect that. However, I have been quite impressed with the lack of snow and how adequate my coat has been. I was pretty positive before I left that I would be living in layers throughout this trip, but so far I have been completely fine with just a tshirt and my winter coat. Oh, I forgot to write that I went to the opera in Vienna and it was really amazing and beautiful and funny and really great. The best part was that it only cost me 3.50 euro!! Yes, the tickets were for standing room only, but it ended up not being too bad, and I got to see the opera!!!!! I mean, that's pretty cool, right?!?! And the other really exciting thing that happened to me in the last few days was that I almost got a 6000 ft fine yesterday on the bus on the way to my hostel. (That translates to about $30.) This is what happened... first I took the BUS number 73 eight stops like my directions told me to do. When I got to the 8th stop and saw that it wasn't called what it was supposed to be called, I figured out that I messed up. So I got back on the bus and went back to the train station. I asked someone where the TROLLEY-BUS number 73 was, and headed in that direction. Before I left the station, though, I decided that I should probably buy a bus ticket since I finally saw a machine in which to buy one. So, I got a ticket, punched it in the little orange box, and stuffed it in my coat pocket to head around the block to catch the trolley-bus. On the bus I found a seat and started counting the stops. We were at stop number 6, when this weird looking lady gets on and sort of just stands in front of me. So I sort of shifted in my seat so that I could look at the names of the stops that were flashing in the front of the bus. All of a sudden, the lady in front of me pulls out a badge and asks for my ticket. I was sort of confused at first, but I reached into my pocket... AND MY TICKET WASN'T THERE!!!!! I sort of started freaking out because I didn't want to miss my stop and we were already at the 7th one. So I looked at her frantically and tried to explain that it was in my pocket but must have fallen out and she just stared at me. Finally, because I was almost in tears and they wouldn't let me off at my stop, the two women made me go to the metro station with them and buy a ticket and showed me how to punch it in the machines. So, basically they didn't understand that I knew how to buy a ticket and use the validation machines, but I was lucky that they decided not to charge me the fine for not having a ticket. It was scary, though, and I was really happy to get to my hostel, finally, two hours later than I had originally planned. Anywho, let this be a lesson to you all: When in Budapest, be sure to know where you put your metro/bus tickets, because they WILL check your ticket at some point, and the fine is NOT cheap like everything else in Budapest. Alright, this is long enough. I'm sure I'll have other adventures to share with you eventually...