An easy hop from Budapest by train, bus, car or boat, the Danube Bend contains a wealth of historic and architectural treasure. Highlights feature in the latest edition of the We Love Hungary guide, our free booklet available at tourist offices in Budapest and beyond. Here are five suggestions for attractions worth a day out to see.
Esztergom Basilica
If there's one sight outside Budapest that you should make a point of seeing, it's this. Standing guard over the border formed by the Danube between Hungary and Slovakia, this iconic landmark features on local banknotes, its hallowed place in Hungarian history assured by the fact that the nation’s first king, Stephen I, is thought to have been crowned here, on Christmas Day, 1000. Hungary’s largest church – largest building, in fact – is a stately 19th-century rebuild of the original medieval cathedral. In the crypt lies the body of its chief architect, János Packh, brutally murdered during the reconstruction. József Hild, later responsible for the Basilica in Budapest, then completed the project.
Esztergom, Szent István tér 1. bazilika-esztergom.hu
Nagymaros main square & waterfront
On the north bank of the Danube, tucked inside the Slovak border, Nagymaros is often visited just for its wonderful view of Visegrád across the water. But there’s more to Nagymaros than a pretty vista of a ruined hilltop citadel. An easy 45 minutes by frequent train from Budapest Nyugati, Nagymaros is best visited on a Saturday when the producers’ market is set up around the town’s main square, Fő tér. Even once stallholders start to pack away from noon onwards, you can stroll past the chestnut trees down to the Danube and the harbour. There, the hourly ferry across to Visegrád is still running, though only for foot passengers due to low water levels.
Szent Anna Parish Church
Also known, for obvious reasons, as the Round Church, this Classicist landmark was opened while the Basilica was being rebuilt. Designed, like the Basilica, by János Packh, the church was commissioned at the behest of Slovak Archbishop Sándor Rudnay. As fate would have it, the archbishop died a week after blessing the cross of the dome here and never lived to see his church unveiled. Partly conceived to mark the restoration of the archbishopric, partly to deflect attention from the big cathedral up the hill, St Anna’s features a plaque in Slovak and Hungarian dedicated to Rudnay.
Esztergom, Rudnay Sándor tér 1
Vác Triumphal Arch
The only one of its kind in Hungary, this historic monument was built by French architect Isidore Canevale for the waterborne visit of Habsburg royal Maria Theresa in 1764. Coming shortly after the monarch had had to pawn her jewellery to help pay for the Seven Years' War which had bankrupted Austria, the empress was in no mood for such frivolities and refused to pass under it. And here it has stood ever since, its grand entrance to the Danube blocked by Vác Prison from 1777 onwards, traffic rushing beneath the arch parallel to the M2 motorway. Few drivers would realise the rarity of this landmark, an Arc de Triomphe unveiled more than 70 years before its namesake counterpart in Paris.
Vác, Köztársaság út 65
Visegrád Citadel
Grand and fortified in medieval times, this former royal residence was a ruin when excavations began in 1934. Now open to the public, it is partly reconstructed, its panoramic view still unparalleled. Presiding over a town of under 2,000 people, Visegrád Citadel became Hungary’s royal seat in 1325, ten years before hosting one of Europe’s earliest round-table peace conferences. Aided by copious amounts of wine, Charles I of Hungary and his Bohemian and Polish counterparts agreed an alliance that is echoed today in the looser one of Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. The so-called Visegrád Four still co-operates on cultural, economic and energy matters. Revered medieval monarch Mátyás made Visegrád his summer palace before its destruction by the Turks. Undiscovered for 300 years, these ruins can now be explored – in warmer months, you may even see the occasional archery contest take place.
