Free audio walk in Budapest
The banks of the Danube
- 120 min
- 5.7 km
- 15 stops
- Free
Starts at Id. Antall József rakpart
About this walk
A walk along both banks of the Danube, past the buildings that nearly every visitor passes by without knowing what they're looking at.
The stops
Walk them in order; each story plays when you reach its pin.
- 1Stop 1
The Danube at the Parliament
Where the walk begins, on the bank of a river that touches ten countries and four capital cities.
- 2Stop 2
The Parliament Up Close
Nineteen designs, forty million bricks, and an architect who went blind before his building was finished.
Read the story - 3Stop 3
The embankment below Parliament
In March 1838 the ice jammed, half of Pest collapsed, and a baron took to a rowing boat.
Read the story - 4Stop 4
The Shoes on the Danube
Sixty pairs of cast-iron shoes along the edge of the embankment, their toes pointing towards the water.
Read the story - 5Stop 5
The Gresham Palace
An English insurer built a palace here, which later spent forty years falling to pieces.
Read the story - 6Stop 6
The Vigadó and the korzo
The ballroom that was shot to pieces from across the river, and the building that took its place.
Read the story - 7Stop 7
The Elizabeth Bridge
The white bridge above you is the second one; the first held the world record until 1926.
Read the story - 8Stop 8
The loading quay on Belgrád rakpart
The stones you're walking over are the structure itself: a harbour and a dike in one.
Read the story - 9Stop 9
The Great Market Hall
A market hall where the barges sailed in beneath the floor, and which burned down ten days before it opened.
Read the story - 10Stop 10
The Liberty Bridge
The emperor drove in the final rivet, though it was actually pushed into place with a press.
Read the story - 11Stop 11
Szent Gellért tér
The hill above you had a different name until a bishop was thrown off it in 1046.
Read the story - 12Stop 12
The Rudas Baths
An octagonal pool beneath an Ottoman dome, in use for more than four hundred and fifty years.
Read the story - 13Stop 13
The Tabán
A whole neighbourhood once lay beneath this grass, with vineyards, taverns and hundreds of houses.
Read the story - 14Stop 14
The Várkert Bazár
A shopping arcade beneath the palace gardens that never caught on, and spent twenty years as the country's rock venue.
Read the story - 15Stop 15
The Chain Bridge
A week spent waiting for the ice to clear cost Széchenyi his father's funeral and gave the city its first permanent bridge.
Read the story
Ready when you are
Walk The banks of the Danube with ROODS.
15 stops through Budapest, about 120 minutes. Open ROODS in your browser, walk to the first pin and the story plays.
- Stories on a map, with narrated audio
- Walk at your own pace, stop where you like
- Runs in your browser. An app is optional.
