2 Best Sights in Budapest, Hungary

At the foot of Gellért Hill, the gorgeous Gellért Baths has beauty and history in spades, with hot springs that have supplied curative baths for nearly 2,000 years. The entrance to the spa is on a side street to the right of the palatial Danubius Hotel Gellért, although the pair are no longer run by the same company. These baths are unsurprisingly popular among tourists so you will want to book ahead online. Budapest's baths, once segregated, are now primarily co-ed (with special hours for segregated bathing for some baths), and it's the same story here. Men and women can now use all steam and sauna rooms as well as both the indoor pool and the outdoor wave pool—a Jazz Age classic that claims to be one of the first wave pools in the world—at the same time. Come for the lovely tiles, architecture, and painted glass, and stay for the range of treatments (some of which require a doctor's prescription).

This bath on the riverbank boasts perhaps the most damatically beautiful interior of all of Budapest's baths, with the original Turkish pool the star of the show. A high, domed roof admits pinpricks of bluish-green light into the dark, circular stone hall with its austere columns and arches. The central octagonal pool catches the light from the glass-tiled cupola and casts it around the surrounding six pools, capturing the feeling of an ancient Turkish hammam. The Rudas's highly fluoridated waters have been known for 1,000 years---and the baths themselves date back to the 16th century. The baths vary in temperature from 16 to 42 degrees Celsius, and you can also drink the water from three springs in the 'drinking hall'. The thermal part is open by day Monday and Wednesday to Friday to men only, Tuesday to women only, and weekends to both sexes. A less interesting outer swimming pool is also co-ed. A 20-minute massage costs 7000 HUF. Soak after-hours here on Friday and Saturday nights from 10 pm to 4 am.