Balatonfoldvar, Hungary was the perfect place for my dad and I to wrap up our 8-day adventure tour. We had seen the big Balaton Lake from the train when we went to Croatia and it looked like a great place to stop. On our way back to Budapest, we stopped in Balatonfoldvar for a night.
Balaton lake is a long, thin body of water that is located at about the halfway point between Budapest and Hungary's western border. It's a gorgeous lake surrounded by resorts and vacation communities. We chose to stay in Balatonfoldvar because the train had stopped here on the way to Croatia and the little train station was too pretty to ignore.
We stayed at the Hotel Fonix which is an easy walk from the train station. We were there at the end of August and the whole town felt empty. In the hotel, I kept getting "The Shining" vibes. Like it was the beginning of the movie and everyone was packing up the Overlook Hotel and getting ready to leave for the winter. It was a great place, but my mind kept drifting towards that old horror movie.
After we checked in and dropped off our bags, my dad and I went out for a walk. We wanted to check out the lake.
The lake was pretty and calm, and it seemed like we had the whole place mostly to ourselves.
A nice path goes next to the lake. It seemed like an awesome place to take a vacation. According to Wikipedia, the area is very popular with Hungarians, Germans, and Austrians for holidays.
There were a few boats out on the water, but most were parked.
We found a nice little place on the water to have some refreshments. It was a great place to enjoy the scenery and soak up some sun in the nice cool breeze.
We only had one evening in Balatonfoldvar, so we didn't get to see a lot of it. I was feeling a little rundown from the adventure tour activities so it was a perfect place for me to unwind. Mostly we just walked around and enjoyed the quiet, quaint vacation community.
After dinner, we went back out to the lake to see the sunset. The colors were magical and hinted at the end of summer.
The geese and ducks were familiar with people and they made good subjects for photography.
The next day we got up and checked out of the hotel. We walked to the cute little train station and took a train to Budapest. The train station was great. It looked more like a park than a train station.
We took the train to Budapest and had one last night together. We found a room in a house that used to belong to a Duke. It was pretty awesome! My dad had to leave super early to catch his flight. He was flying back to the United States.
My flight was later in the afternoon so I was able to sleep in, then I had 3-4 hours to kill after checking out of the room. I generally try to avoid situations like that because wandering around the city for hours with my backpack on me isn't very enjoyable. That day I was flying to Greece to meet up with my brother 
I killed some time in the city, then got bored of sitting around. I decided to head to the airport early. The plan was to meet my brother in Athens airport where we would catch a connecting flight and fly together to Santorini.
While I was wandering around the airport in Budapest, someone snuck up behind me and demanded that I give them my wallet! I turned around and it was
Stay tuned for the next few posts as