Central Europe

posts from Central Europe

Salzburg, Austria

Travel Diary: Salzburg, Austria

Budapest, Hungary

What To Do With 36 Hours in Budapest

Lake Bled, Slovenia

Travel Diary: Lake Bled, Slovenia

What to pack

What to pack depends completely on when you go! I went in the Winter but here are some options for Spring & Summer!

Know before you go

Haley's Top 5 Tips:

• Hungary’s currency is MUCH different than the dollar. For every 1 U.S. dollar, it equals approximately 270 Hungarian Forint.

• With that said, be careful when taking out money. Not only is the currency different but the way they display an amount of money is different. They use a decimal where we would use a comma. For example, upon arriving in Budapest, I went to get cash out of the ATM for the cab to the hotel. The ATM displayed 120.000 Hungarian Forint, which I thought was 120 Hungarian Forint. After doing the conversion, that equaled less than $1, which should have been a red flag but I didn’t know what else to do so I just committed to the choice. After arriving at the hotel, I got an alert from my bank via text that I authorized an ATM withdrawal of $460. After a little research, I realized that 120.000 Hungarian Forint was actually 120,000 Hungarian Forint, in the way WE display numbers. So, BE. CAREFUL! Hungary makes a lot of money off of naive tourists like myself upon arriving in their country!

• In order to rent a car in Hungary, you must have an international drivers license. Also, be sure to brush up on which countries along your journey require a car decal. You can get them at the gas station in countries like Slovenia and Austria. If you don’t get one, you will pay a hefty fine when crossing the border. Trust me.