Secrets of the Cabbage: Budapest Beer Bike and Kert Tour

Usually I don't make a big fuss out of my birthday, but you only turn 40 once, and even then only with a bit of luck, so I figured why not see if I could extract some free beers out of my local nearest and dearest. But no sooner did I send out my email to meet up at one of the kerts, that is, one of the beer gardens installed in various courtyards and parks around Budapest during the warmer months, than Móni took over planning, and I was completely in the dark what would be my fate.

The evening started normally enough as designated decoy Adrian led me around the inner 7th district for an hour or two, and finally to a sizeable group of people at Dürer Kert, a couple blocks away from home. Albrecht Dürer is actually of Hungarian origin, name germanized from the Hungarian Ajtósi which also means a guy who makes doors. Except this is not common knowledge so they name his street Ajtósi-Dürer Street just to make it absolutely clear, and here we are hoisting aged cherry pálinka in his kert. Albrecht wasn't around though.

Then a gate was opened and I was led to a strange contraption that proved to be the beer bike we had seen a few times being pedalled around town by joyous revellers and now we too would share their merriment for the next two hours. Blasting pop music (no one though to bring my highlights from the Ring of the Nibelungen CD, which is probably just as well) we made our way down Dózsa György and then Andrássy Avenue, which is roughly the equivalent of riding such a device down Pennsylvania Avenue or Broadway, as far as the Oktogon. Interestingly, no one honked their horns at us and most people smiled and waved as they pulled around us, which seems unusual for grumpy Budapest drivers in immediately post-rush-hour traffic.

As the sweaty birthday boy, I got excused from pedalling after a while, and instead served up the delightful beer bike craft beer to my thirsty beasts of burden. Then after a break for a restorative pleszkavica (they call it a Balkan Burger) at Kertem in the City Park, I got to pop the handbrake and put terrified expressions on the faces of my co-travellers as we veered and swerved through the stygian twisty lanes. Totally cool!

With the beer bike safely back in its garage, we took the much less exotic no. 74 trolley to the Mika Tivadar Kert, where waiting were another host of friends who were either too cool or not cool enough for the beer bike. And I got a Sachertorte and a whole bunch of neat-o presents and cards.