Now we’re turning to the left, and we will go along the River Danube, you’ll see it soon.

The Danube flows through 8 countries, 4 capitals, Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest and Belgrade. It rises in the Black Forest in Germany, and flows into the Black Sea, Ukraine.

The length of the river in Budapest is 29 km, in Hungary 417 km.

The river is also known as the Blue Danube. Johann Strauss composed a waltz with this title when he was here in the city. But to tell you the truth, the river is usually not blue.  Of course the Danube wasn’t so polluted at that time when Strauss was here, but nowadays the colour of the river is brown or grey.

On your right that big white building was the headquarters of the former Hungarian Workers’ Socialist Party in the last part of the 20^th century until the changing of the political system in 1989. The building is made of white marble, that’s why we called it the White House at that time. Nowadays there are the offices of the ministers of parliament and parliament-committees in the building.

In a minute we’ll cross over the Margaret Bridge. This bridge was the second in the city, built between 1872 and 1876. The length of the bridge is over 600 m, it’s 25 m wide and has got a special V-shape. It was designed by the French Eiffel’s company. This bridge connects the Grand Boulevard on the Pest side and the Margaret Boulevard on the Buda side. It is a quite important bridge. There is usually traffic jam, a lot of people use it and a tramway line goes on the bridge too.

We are on the bridge now, please have a look at the Margaret Island on your right. The island is 2,5 km long, it’s a lovely park, great for taking walks, for running or to relax. The bridge and the island are also named after Saint Margaret. According to the tradition, our king Béla IV vowed during the Mongol Invasion – middle of the 13^th century – that if Hungary survived his daughter Margaret would be brought up as a nun. Fortunately the country survived so because the king offered his daughter to the service of God, Margaret went to the island where a convent was built for Dominican nuns. Margaret went there when she was 9 and she died there when she was 29. She was canonized in 1943.

On the island you can find two hotels, an Open Air Theatre, a Musical Fountain and the Palatinus Bath. If you have free time, I can recommend you to visit the island.

Now please have a look back on the Pest side, on your left you can see the beautiful view of the Parliament.