Our next stop was the Bethlen Gábor Kollégium, a Hungarian taught college. We dropped off a bunch of boxes full of Hungarian literature books and got to look around the school. I don't think the building itself was very old but the school was.
From the college we walked to a winery. We got to look at the barrels where all the wine was stored and they were huge! Easily six feet in diameter. We ate a meal there, some meat and potatoes, and got to taste a little bit of different wines. Us kids mostly just drank the base, I'm not sure what its called. Its just super super sugary grape juice.
Our hotel for the night had a beautiful view and dog so all was good. Dinner was fun, the waiter were dressed in the black and red traditional looking clothes and the food was delicious as usual. Matthew would appreciate the huge variety of soups they have here.
In the morning we just drove down the road a few minutes. The hotel was in a small, touristy town. The houses are all so cute, and there were people selling things on the street.
This is a really old church that was there, though its been fixed up, obviously.
We went into a small museum as well. I think there are a lot of mines near here, iron specifically. There were exhibits with iron products and ceramics. My favorite was a really neat exhibit of traditional clothing. Not the red/black/white dresses I've seen before, but a much different sytle of clothing. It was all really beautiful hand.
After the museum we went into a small cottage down the road. It only had two rooms and everything in it was hand made. All the furniture was painted with flowers, it was pretty. The lady showing us around took out a bunch of clothing which we got to look at. Zenkő modeled this ribbon had thing. All the ribbons have different patterns embroidered into them, it was really amazing and looks like it took forever to make.
Next, we drove to a salt mine, which didn't look like much from the surface, but once we got underground it was stunning. This is a picture of the main chamber seen from the top. It's a huge bell shaped thing with a lake at the bottom. There were hanging lights everywhere too which lit everything up, here they're hanging down into the pit. The walls were really pretty because the salt is marbled into the stone.
In another large chamber, the main one, there was a sort of mini amusement park. Here's a picture of the ferris wheel. There was also a mini golf course, ping pong tables, pool tables, a tiny amphitheater thing, and boats on the little lake all the way at the bottom. We got to go on the ferris wheel and it was so cool.
Here's looking down into the mini lake.
This is what the actual tunnels look like now. There was salt crystalizing on everything, the walls, stairs, ceiling, lights.
We spent a while in the salt mines. When we were done we walked around the town itself for a bit. It was bigger than Udvarhely and very cute. The buildings along the main street were cool looking.
This clock played out Fur Elise on the hour.
We went into this historical church where in 1588 a Hungarian King made a declaration of freedom of religion for the first time (or something to that effect, that's what it says on the plaque).
After this, we headed back home, as per usual the country side was gorgeous.
