Five days is enough to leave the city for a day without feeling you have cut the city short — and Hungary’s trains make that easy.
Days one to three
As in the three-day plan.
Day four — out of the city
Three real options, in order of how easy they are:
- Szentendre — a riverside town of painted houses and galleries, about forty minutes north on the HEV suburban railway from Batthyany ter. ⚠️ The HEV crosses the city boundary, so an ordinary Budapest ticket does not cover the whole ride — you need the supplement, sold at the station.
- The Danube Bend — Visegrad and Esztergom, by bus, train or, in season, by boat. The scenic version, and a longer day.
- Eger — about two hours east by train, a baroque town with a castle and the wine cellars of the Valley of the Beautiful Women.
Domestic trains are run by MAV and are inexpensive; buy at the station or in the app. Returns are usually simply double the single, so there is rarely an advantage to booking ahead — the thing to check is which station your train leaves from.
Day five — the second bath, and the parts everyone misses
Do the other bath. If day two was Szechenyi, make this Gellert — they are not the same experience and the contrast is the point.
Then the things a shorter trip cuts: Margaret Island for an afternoon, the Buda hills, the covered pasazs off Wenceslas-scale boulevards, or simply District XIII along the river, which is where people actually live.
What five days changes
It stops you rushing the baths and it lets a wet day be a wet day. Keep the day trip flexible and spend it on the first clear morning.
Other lengths of trip
Journey times and opening patterns as published for 2026 and checked on 4 September 2026. Timetables, fares and closing days change without much warning — confirm with the operator or the institution before you travel. All the plans are in Itineraries & Day Plans.