Today we went to the cave baths of Miskolc, another mediumish sized town in eastern Hungary. Both Amanda and I are really getting into the whole swimming deal, or at least the splashing around in the thermal baths and buying the necessary accessories (goggles, caps, bathers etc). One day, I'm sure we'll get around to actually doing laps, but for now we're quite happy relaxing in the mineral spas and bathing pools thank you very much. We have found a bath (read: swimming pool) at the nearby town of Nyírbátor, although I fell sick from an ear infection (are we /sure/ these pools don't have to be chlorinated?), I was convinced to try, what we are told are, the most beautiful baths in Hungary. The Miskolc cave baths.
They were, I must admit, awfully impressive. It seems that they have been in use since "ancient times" but have only become popular during the occupation of the Ottoman empire (16th-17th century). I'm sure there is a floating footstool joke lurking around here somewhere but I'll let it lie for now.
It seems that since the Ottoman's enthusiasm for the baths, they have gone through periods of disrepair (the 18th- 19th century were dark, dark days for the Miskolctapolca baths apparently), but luckily the 20th-21st centuries have been fairly kind thus far.
This said, it does appear that the global financial crisis has hit even the hardest working members of the cave bath community.
I certainly hope things pick up for this hard working mensch.
Anyway, we eventually did find a gainfully employed door and did our best to ensure that it would remain so by entering into the change rooms. The change rooms are worthy of note, if only to fill out this paragraph so that the pictures align properly and we don't rush ahead with the cave bath narrative, because they were co-ed.
Well, sort of, you enter in through a small cubical with a door on either end, both of which lock from the same mechanism. You get changed, then leave through the opposite door into the locker room.
Mmm... nicely spaced.The actual caves were awesome. You entered through quite a wide opening into a fairly extensive network of caves. The entire network was basically flooded with the mineral spring water.
In addition to the main network, there were a number of warmer pools, bigger waterfall like things, rock bridges, saunas, and even a room that seemed to be strangely set up as a planetarium (if sticking some fluorescent moon stickers onto the roof of the cave and adding strange lights and music is equal to a planetarium). It was probably closer to a 12 years old girl's sleepover party. If you flooded their bedroom with salt water. And invited a cluster of half naked Europeans of varying ages and ethnicities.
Still it was pretty awesome.
I'd also like to point towards the awesome photography work to get the above picture while standing in a pool of running water trying to take a photo of a dark place inter-spaced with bright spotlights. Oooh yeah.
Anyway, once we were done swimming we had a picnic in the park outside, saw some very cute squirrels and ate some delicious donuts.
the cave water has chlorine...I asked because my skin reacts to it, and they told me they use it.
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