By Stuart Forster
Winter city breaks notoriously divide opinion. Some people hate the thought of sightseeing on chilly days. Others love the idea of exploring without the crowds of summer.
So long as I’ve got my thick coat and woolly hat, I’m happy looking around European cities in winter. A four-day trip to Budapest appealed primarily because of the prospect of visiting its Christmas markets. Yet compared to those of Austria and Germany, I found much of the food available at Budapest’s Christmas markets shockingly expensive. From a stall at Vörösmarty Square, in the heart of the city, a traditional langos bread topped with chicken paprikash cost 9,350 forint (£21.60).
While the Christmas markets, unfortunately, left the impression of being overpriced tourist traps, Budapest was otherwise a great place to explore. The Hungarian capital is famed for its thermal baths – a legacy of 145 years of Ottoman occupation. The largest, and reputedly the grandest, is the Szechenyi Baths. But I decided to head to one of the oldest, the Rudas Baths, whose central dome and steam room is around 450 years old. Its rooftop hot tub, with panoramic views of the River Danube, is a recent addition. Sipping a beer, while soaking there, I enjoyed the cityscape and the self-obsessed antics of pouting influencers creating – and then retaking – videos of themselves ‘relaxing’.
From there, it was a short taxi ride to Castle Hill to check out blue hour views of the city from the Fisherman’s Bastion – a viewing platform high above the Danube. Reminiscent of a fairytale castle, the seven cone-topped turrets of the Neo-Gothic landmark represent the founding tribes of Hungary. Many of the people snapping photos attempted to include the resplendent façade of the illuminated national parliament building on the far side of the Danube.
Night had well and truly cloaked the city by the time I strolled across the Szechenyi Chain Bridge. When the suspension bridge first opened, in 1849, Buda and Pest were still separate cities.
Sculpted life-size footwear ranges along a stretch of the riverbank between the bridge and the parliament. Shoes on the Danube Bank is a poignant reminder of the murders of approximately 20,000 Jewish people by militia members aligned with the Arrow Cross Party in the winter of 1944-45. The people whose bodies were about to be swept away by the river were ordered to remove their footwear, as shoes could be sold, before being killed.
To warm up, I popped into the elegant Café Gerbeaud, one of a handful of grand coffeehouses in the city. The Central Café and New York Café are among others that attract people because of their history and aesthetics. Far simpler in design, the recently opened Time Out Market proved an upbeat place to sip a rounded wine while enjoying Michelinstarred chef Pesti István’s version of goulash – a satisfying dish costing a little over half the price of my Christmas market food.
The Hungarian State Opera is a palatial performing arts venue with hour-long guided tours three times a day. Its seasonal performances of Tchaikovsky’s ballet The Nutcracker are worth booking well in advance. Experiencing the venue, staging, orchestral performance and clever choreography more than justified the £62 ticket price, and warranted packing a suit so as not to look out of place among the regulars. More accustomed to halftimes than intervals, I headed up the grand staircase for a glass of bubbly impressed by the experience and glad that I hadn’t gone to see Ferencvaros play football instead.
With its walkability and array of experiences, Budapest proved an engaging destination for a winter city break and has enough that I’d like to return.
Travel information
Find out more about things to do in Hungary’s capital city by visiting the budapestinfo.hu website.
Jet2holidays.com offers city breaks to Budapest. Jet2.com operates flights from Newcastle to Budapest twice a week until 23 April 2026. The service resumes on 5 November for the 2026-27 winter season.
The Mystery Hotel Budapest (mysteryhotelbudapest.com), is an 82-room hotel with a ground-floor spa. Within walking distance of major attractions, the hotel occupies grand premises built during the 1890s as a Masonic temple.