i fell in love with Budapest on my first evening there. It was late August 2011, and I was starting a three-month literary residency with the Jozsef Attila K6r association. As I traveled in a taxi toward Veres Palné Street, the light fell in a rich afternoon dazzle, and the trees bowed over the grand boulevards under the emerald weight of their foliage. Cyclists whizzed along paths, and people crammed onto bright yellow trams. Aside from the incongruous graffiti, the setting resembled a 19th-century period film.
That night, I wandered through cobbled streets where sidewalk cafés buzzed with conversation, crowds danced around street musicians, and couples sought privacy in the shadows beneath lush trees. A building pockmarked with holes from World War II mortar fire was a reminder of the miracle of this city—that so many of its old-world treasures remain intact. The Danube was astonishingly broad, the light-flecked hills of Buda towering on the other side, the blazing dome of Buda Castle perched at the very top. I flowed with the crowd across the Széchenyi Chain Bridge, past its massive lion statues. Standing on the Buda side of the river, I took in the fantastical double view of the House of Parliament and its reflection. The building’s neo-Gothic domes and spires were lit up against the indigo night, creating Impressionist dapples on the river. I hadn’t expected the elegance and splendor of the grand Art Nouveau buildings, both imposing and delicate, casually arrayed along streets and boulevards in various states of decline, as if they weren’t architectural marvels. I’m ashamed to say I’d imagined Budapest to be blockier, dulled by Soviet brutalist design. As someone born and raised in Beirut, I thought I was above making easy assumptions about a place. After all, my city, too, surprises visitors with its vibrancy.
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der April 2023-Ausgabe von Condé Nast Traveler US.
Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.
Bereits Abonnent ? Anmelden
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der April 2023-Ausgabe von Condé Nast Traveler US.
Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.
Bereits Abonnent? Anmelden
Sands of Time - Sculpted by millennia, Chad is a place of ancient geology and epic grandeur. Aminatta Forna finds her place in it all
The 15,000-square-mile Ennedi Massif, in north-eastern Chad, is a plateau the size of Switzerland. Between 350 million and 500 million years ago, this part of the globe was an ocean. Then the ocean disappeared, leaving the sandstone floor exposed. The climate shifted from rain-soaked to arid. Sun, wind, and water sculpted the sandstone into a dramatic, desolate, unearthly landscape of gorges and valleys, inselbergs and stacks, towering tassili and natural arches. In the desert the delicate threads of life become apparent in trails of tiny footprints scattered across the sands: here, the tear-shaped tracks of a lizard; there, the dimpled prints of a gerbil.
Antiques Road Show - After buying a second home, in France, the designer Claire Vivier called up fellow designer Kate Berry to go on the ultimate shopping spree
When Los Angeles-based designer Clare Vivier began decorating the 19th-century house she'd bought in her husband's hometown of Saint-Calais, in France's Loire Valley, she had a particular aesthetic in mind. I love color and patterns but wanted something peaceful, so the intention was to create a dialogue between those two things, she says. She wanted the house to have a blend of contemporary pieces, antiques, and textiles from heritage maisons to create a space that, much like her namesake handbag and fashion label, channeled both California fun and French sophistication. She also knew that she wanted her longtime friend Kate Berry, a designer and creative director, to help her make it happen.
The Slow Road - Rather than rush from Tokyo to Kyoto by train, as most visitors to Japan do, Tom Vanderbilt chose to bike - coasting down country roads, spying snow monkeys, and refueling with hearty bowls of soba
Rather than rush from Tokyo to Kyoto by train, as most visitors to Japan do, Tom Vanderbilt chose to bike - coasting down country roads, spying snow monkeys, and refueling with hearty bowls of soba. At the peak of the day's heat, I pulled into the tiny hamlet of Hirase, in Japan's Gifu Prefecture. I'd just climbed a twisting, waterfall-lined road several thousand feet through Hakusan National Park before descending into the shimmering fantasy landscape of Shirakawa-go, an almost Tolkien-esque village (and UNESCO World Heritage Site) comprising centuries-old farmhouses with peaked thatch roofs.
SHAILENE WOODLEY on FIJI
I was in Suva, the capital of Fiji, making a film, and our crew took over half of the Grand Pacific Hotel.
easy does it
Beyond the bubble of Queenstown, New Zealand's majestic Otago region offers the kinds of adventures you can truly appreciate only by slowing down
gather round
The secret ingredient in Philadelphia's lauded food scene? The empathy of the locals behind it
THE PAST IS PRESENT
Beguilingly complex Istanbul has done a lot of soul-searching in recent years. Lale Arikoglu digs into the city's modern identity - while tracing the roots of her own
Creation Story
Modern-day craftspeople are bringing back traditional Arabian arts in Jeddah's Old Town of Al-Balad
Continental Drift
For her first trip to Africa, aboard an HX Hurtigruten cruise ship, Sarah Greaves Gabbadon confronts her assumptions about what a homeland means
On the Rise
With new hotels, climbing routes, and biking trails, Colorado's low-key, high-elevation Western Slope is ripe for adventure