Budapest’s Fishermans Bastion

 

When I first visited Fishermans Bastion in 2015 it quickly went down as one of my favorite places in Hungary so when I was  planning our family trip in the Fall of last year I made sure we would pay a visit to this gorgeous spot,.  If you are going to go I suggest you break your trip into three sections: walk around Fishermans Bastion, climb Matthias Church, and then wander around Fishermans Bastion at dusk. 

 

The reason I suggest you visit the Halaszbastya, the name for Fishermans Bastion in Hungarian, is the panoramic viewing terrace offer magical views over the city.  We may have gone on a walking tour that was so poor we broke off half way though (more as the group was too big and it was too hard to hear the guide) but the area is so pretty I suggest the self guided walking tour. In Fishermans Bastion there are two sets of terraces you can walk,  the lower terrace which is free and the upper terrace which usually has a fee but as we visited outside of high season (March to September) we were able to pass through the turnstile without a paid ticket.  

 

 

Then once you get a sense of the whole Castle Hill area  I highly recommend a visit to Matthias Church. In my opinion you can skip the inside (you can see pictures I took of it here) – and book a ticket to climb the tower.  This building is quite interesting as it was built as a Church in 764, then served as a great mosque for hundreds of years until the mid 1850s when the Jesuit order transformed it into a church and then King Mathias built the tower and named it after himself. The tower tour was great – not merely a walk up the very tall tower but a full hour long experience featuring  three mini exhibits inside about the history of the area, structure, and construction along with a tour of the bells.  The view from the top was a spectacular panoramic. 

 

And then the third recommendation, visiting the Fishermans Bastion at dusk where the Pest side of the city lights up and the view of the Danube and Hungarian Parliament are absolutely breathtaking!   The actual Bastion only dates back to 1895 and was built in a Neo-Romanesque style spanning approximately 140 meters (460 feet) long on what used to be part of the Buda Castle Walls.   The exact history is unknown bit it is thought there was a similar structure e in this location in the Middle Ages which protected the guild of fisherman.