Aug 28 2025 

Where does one find a Beatles museum? In Eger Hungary of course. 

First day of the tour with our Intrepid group. Made our way out of Budapest on two trams and a train. Great old trams with quite the heavy duty mechanical steps. 

Our train took us to Eger in Eastern Hungary. Eger looms large in Hungarian history as they fended off the Ottoman invaders in 1552. Not quite as much is made of the fact that the defenders were not so successful in 1596. 

On the train Lori read about the Beatles museum. Our guide had never been but says others had reported on it favourably. We asked… it was created by an English man who lives in Eger and is teaching English. Very well done museum. Not just an assortment of stuff.  Very respectfully and professionally displayed and organized. 

We next headed to the Lyceum to see the optical museum and, most importantly, the oldest remaining camera obscura in Europe. 

Our guide had strategically left out the bit that it was 9 floors up. When we were buying the tickets Lori and I looked at each other and said “Did she really say nine floors?”  But it was so worth it. Fascinating demonstration.

Also a great display of preserved observatory equipment (as Lori observed: I do like a good meridian) and old cameras and microscopes. 

Then it was off to the aforementioned castle for a wander around the grounds.. in the 30+ degrees. 

Thus we we quite relieved that evening when the wine tasting, which included the Bull’s Blood of castle defence legend, was in a nice cool cellar. 

Had some very tasty perch for supper. 

In all we covered 14km just within the city of Eger!  Which is actually less than what we’ve been doing in a daily basis.