MAV Rail Tours Buso Express

The train departs from the Kelenföld station. The station is a less than interesting creation of recent years, no grand architecture just function. Basically an underground corridor with stairs up to each platform. Below that is the M4 metro station which is sort of nice. This is the same station RegioJet uses with its service from Vienna. Reaching the station from home in Pest is a bit inconvenient as it requires 3 metro lines and about 40 minutes.

I arrived 30 minutes early as did most of the other passengers. As I expected they were ALL Hungarians.

We had a couple of 55F dry days but just in time for this trip the temps dropped 10F and rain is in the forecast for the day. Here is hoping for the best.

My tickets are for the best of the first class service. Something called Panorama Max meaning the sides are almost total glass. We have a table for two on one side of the aisle. Comfortable. But they are heavly renovated rolling stock from 1990 - 2000 and could use the addition of USB chargers and WiFi. Fortunately there was cell service all the way down and back and I brought a couple of power supplies.

As I mentioned, this isn’t marketed to foreign tourists so all the announcements before the start of the trip and during the trip have been in Hungarian. The conductor and the attendant that brought us water seemed a bit surprised when I said “thank you”.

And we are off: https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1EFPSD7yiw/
There were two stops prior to Kelenföld at remoted "bus stops" I am guessing just on the way in from where the equipment is stored. The only stop after Kelenföld is at a small rural station called Pusztaszabolcs where we took on 2 more passengers. This car is about ¾ full. Now its nonstop to Mohacs in about 4.5 hours. In a while I will go check out the dining car.

About an hour out of Mohacs the snow began. Snow and whipping wind like something out of a Tom Hanks train cartoon.

Then two announcements as we approached Mohacs. Two lengthy announcements ... in a foreign language. So, we just hoped for the best and left the train, following the majority who we assumed knew where they were going. Within minutes the sky began clearing. It was going to be a pretty but cold and windy day.

I won’t describe the festival other than to say it was well worth the trip. I will post a couple photos but that video link above is accurate.

The only issue with the trip so far has been the Mohacs train station. It’s a small semi abandoned building with no public front and no signage to help you find it. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/44/Moh%C3%A1cs_vas%C3%BAt%C3%A1llom%C3%A1s.jpg/1280px-Moh%C3%A1cs_vas%C3%BAt%C3%A1llom%C3%A1s.jpg Of the 3 exterior doors that still serve a purpose, the waiting room, the size of a Motel 6 bedroom, only had a photocopied piece of paper taped on it with something printed in Hungarian.

One other door had a sign in Hungarian, German and Russian. I recognized the word Verboten and left it alone. Oh, why did I care? We returned to the station and the train was gone. I wanted to confirm that one of the earlier recorded messages wasn’t important.

After confirming that the station was indeed the station, we went in search of dinner and ended up at Kovács Panzió és Étterem https://maps.app.goo.gl/kPzLukJpaXsrsBFY7. Absolutely, positively the best stuffed cabbage in 20+ years of visiting Hungary. Monstrous rolls, where did they find cabbage leaves that large, served with pork ribs and enough pickled cabbage to fill two people per place. Two beers and two cabbages about $27.

On the return trip my traveling companion set up her phone to record the announcements as Hungarian text, then translate them to English (more or less). Mostly some advertising. Oh, and we each got a Mohacs Buso Express refrigerator magnet. I will hand it to MAV, they try.

Arrived back in Budapest at about 11:15 pm took the M4 and the 4/6 tram and a short walk home and in bed by 12:45. A good day. I will do this again. Maybe the Slovakia trip.

Glad you made it back to Mohacs and that it was a successful day! I have looked at the Danube Bend one, since I do like trains.

But do note that these are not geared for tourists. They do everything in a foreign language. We were the only non-Hungarians i spotted on a train of maybe 200 passengers.

On the Danube Bend trip the stops appear to be more geared to Hungarian weekend spots than tourist attractions. But that could be fun.

The Graz trip might be fun, but I would stay a few nights and come back on a conventional train. The Slovak train is interesting too. Goes places I love but havent seen in a decade. Trying to travel Slovakia by train is a chore, but this simplifies it.