May I introduce you to the thermal baths of Budapest?

After four or five days of nonstop sightseeing, there was no better idea than to grab a pair of shorts for a bathing suit and head up to the Szechenyi Bath for a prolonged soak. The place is a large spa complex that has existed since 1881. No mere tourist trap, the locals bathe here in great numbers, arriving in the morning and slipping in and out of pools and saunas until the early evening.

I can’t remember what all the various rooms are called, but the place consists of a series of pools of varying temperatures, some stirred with Jacuzzi jets, others with large fountains spitting water onto the shoulders of bathers below. The first pool upon entrance is a deep pool of formidable Arctic-cold water that I foolishly underestimated. I jumped out and ran immediately to the adjacent warm bath, which was much more agreeable, and proceeded to spend a good hour in there, staring at the ceiling and the ornate pillars that held it up, thinking of nothing much. Afterward, we walked outside and spent the rest of our time dipping into the assorted outdoor baths, doing a few perfunctory lengths of the Olympic pool, and so on, until my sunburned shoulders decided that it was time to go.

We’ve since moved onto Serbia, with some regret, as I really enjoyed Budapest and would definitely recommend it to anyone. We are now in Novi Sad, two hours north of Belgrade, and I’m writing this in an Internet cafe full of chain-smoking teenagers playing World of Warcraft (a relief from the Hungarian cafes full of people looking shamelessly at porn). It’s growing harder for me to find reliable Internet access, as the hostels tend to have one computer that everyone fights over, and as such it’s been hard to do anything resembling a real post here, but we’ve decided to slow the pace of our travel down a little, and cut out some places. My original travel plans involved trying to make my way all around the Balkans in one shot, skipping only Macedonia and possibly Albania, wandering slowly across Romania and Bulgaria, and taking a conventional beach vacation in Athens or Dubrovnik before heading back up to Munich. But in talking with some people around the hostel and in interpreting my own mood about our trip so far, I’ve decided the best option is to head directly, without stopping/passing Go, to Turkey, and spend as much time there as I’m able. More on this when I get to the next computer.