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HUNGARY: Budapest is always a dream destination for fans of city trips. And a visit is even more exciting when you discover Hungary’s capital by bike. You can rent bikes everywhere and there a lot of exciting bike tours through the city and beyond.

The Adina Apartment Hotel Budapest is located in the Pest district, east of the Danube – only a stone’s throw away from the river and Margaret Island (Margitsziget). This makes it the perfect starting point for a bike tour – regardless whether you stay on the flat side of the city or pedal your way up the Buda Castle Hill west of the Danube. From there you have a spectacular view over the city, so it’s worth being a little out of breath. In recent years, a great network of bike paths has evolved in Budapest, so biking is always fun.

It’s really easy with a “Bubi”: There are more than 1,100 of these rental bikes parked at around 75 stations throughout the city. You can pay conveniently by credit card, hop on and pedal off. However, on lovely days when the sun’s out, you’ll need to be fast because then the bikes are all gone very quickly. If you’re sure to be going, you can book a rental bike or tandem in advance before your trip at Budapest.com. There are also lots of small rental companies for city and trekking bikes, as well as e-bikes, Segways and accessories.  Our Adina team there will be glad to tell you where the nearest shop is located.

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You can also book a bike tour of the city at GetYourGuide – with tourist highlights such as the Sándor Palace, Buda Castle, Fishermen’s Bastion, St. Stephen’s Basilica, Heroes’ Square and Andrassy Avenue. BudaBike Tours is specialised in English-speaking bike tours through the Hungarian capital. The programme includes exciting bike excursions, such as the “Budapest Highlights Tour”, “Retro-Communist Tour”, “Budapest Night Tour” of even the culinary “Bike & Bite Tour”. The “Goulash Bike Tour” will take you, past the city’s most important places of interest, straight to a garden party where you can stew a fiery goulash with the locals and then cycle back to the city centre to boost your digestion.

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And if you feel the calling to escape the metropolis, then the “Blue Danube Tour” might be the right one for you. It sets off from Heroes’ Square in the heart of the city. Taking you across Margaret Island and through undiscovered city districts with a flair of the retro, you’ll ride through Óbuda and upriver through the Danube’s floodplains – past swimming pools, small forests and fields to the baroque artist’s quarter Szentendre. To get back, jump back on your bike or take the tour boat on the Danube.

And yes, of course you can also arrive by bike: if you’re coming from Germany via Passau from Donaueschingen or from Vienna in Austria, you can take the Danube Bike Path and even continue on to the Danube estuary on the Black Sea. By the way, when the weather is bad, cyclists in Hungary have to also wear a high visibility vest.