273. Pécs

Where: Pécs, Hungary
When: July 9, 2017
With: Dave, Aunt Lee, Uncle Joe, Pam, Mary Kate

So this post is a little backwards. The item in the book is the city of Pécs with a suggested side trip to the red wine region of Villány. But anyone who knows my family knows that we love our red wine. So of course, we did this the opposite way (if you could even call it that) by spending two days in Villány, with a one hour pit stop in Pécs.

We arrived in Villány in early afternoon after driving in from Lake Balaton. The town was just one long road lined with adorable little wine cellars, and we were positively giddy upon arrival. 

We were staying at the Gere Hotel, a famous winemaker in the region. The hotel felt a bit like an oasis once we arrived and unloaded our bags in the hot summer sun. 

We even had a little vineyard in the backyard.

After settling in, we started...well...drinking. The kitchen was closed at this time of day, but they still made us one heck of meat and cheese board. That, coupled with the hotel's own rosé, and we were in total heaven. 

After lunch, we set out to explore the town. "Pince" means "wine cellar". Oh boy oh boy oh boy. 

We started off at Bock winery, one of the larger vineyards in the area. The tasting room was big and modern, and the wine was fantastic. We got sooo much wine for not a lot of money. 

The walk to Bock was half the fun, down small lanes with almost no cars on them. It felt like a ghost town, not a popular wine region, even though the wine was exceptional. 

After tasting at Bock, we headed back to the main road to stop in some of the smaller cellars along the way. The first one we stopped at was right across the street from our hotel called Kordik Pince. We walked in, not entirely sure what to expect from this much smaller establishment. We had also lost our translator as Uncle Joe had gone back to the hotel, and very few people around here speak any English. So we tried to mime that we wanted to do a tasting for four and hoped for the best.

The small woman who ran the shop suddenly grabbed a puffy vest (it was 95 degrees outside), a tray and 4 little glasses. Then she opened the massive cellar doors in the back of her kitchen. She gestured for us to start heading down. We were slightly alarmed at what came next. 

Down the dark, uneven staircase we found ourselves in an actual cellar filled with vats. Heaven, is this you?

The view from the bottom. 

On the stairs, there was white fuzzy stuff growing, which we learned was mold. Not only does it make the stairs that much more of an adventure, it improves the wine quality as well. 

We stood down in the cellar for a long time, trying all the wines she had and attempting to converse with the lady that only spoke Hungarian. We were able to gather that the cellar had been in her family for 250 years and we were able to communicate that we were with my uncle who escaped in 1957 (a common year for people to have escaped). We were all laughing so hard trying to communicate with nothing but a pocket Hungarian book. 

We did not want to leave our new friend, but wanted to squeeze in one more cellar before dinner. So we headed down the road to another little kitchen with big doors in the back. At least this time, when we were led down a staircase into a cellar, we knew what to expect. 

However, this cellar was massive! It was recently redone with high ceilings, beautiful decor, and long picnic bench style tables. The owner of this one was equally as nice, and while he had a few more English words, it was still a riot attempting to communicate. He just kept singing us Sweet Caroline. 

That evening, we ate dinner at our hotel's restaurant, Mandula. It was a tasting menu with wine pairings and it was delicious (as far as I remember because I was toasted by this point). After dinner, we sat out on Pam's balcony drinking more wine and then cracking into our mini-fridge palinka. Some may call that a low-point, but it was such a fun evening under the full moon and stars, laughing until the wee hours. 

However, I was not laughing the next morning when I was hot, hungover and tired. The city of Pécs was so close and yet felt so far. I was ready to bail, but Dave, my trusty enabler, insisted we'd regret it if we didn't go. So I left my family soaking away in the pool to brave a hot, sweaty afternoon exploring Pécs.

My mood turned a corner almost immediately though. The drive to Pécs was stunning. We went along the wine road, cutting through hills covered in vineyards, small villages and sunflower fields. It was so unbelievably stunning, I can't believe this little region hasn't been discovered and exploited yet.

Even the approach to Pécs is pretty spectacular. After driving along past nothing but tiny villages, we spotted Hungary's fifth largest city in the distance, climbing up the side of a mountain. 

We took advantage of free parking at a shopping mall, and started to walk into the car-free portion of center city. I was already a huge fan because the people of Pécs know how to keep a person cool. Calling upon their days under Ottoman Turk rule, they draped tapestries across the tops of the buildings like a bazaar to block out the sun and keep things cool as we climbed uphill towards the center. 

As we approached the center of town, we passed a little fountain with metal spouts of varying colors. Is it bronze? Copper? Gold?

Apparently it's none of the above. It actually isn't metal, but pottery, glazed with eosin, a technique perfected by the Zsolnay family. The family started their ceramic company here in Pécs in 1853, and it has been used all over the country (including the statues in the Gellert baths and the roof of Matthias Church). 

After the fountain, we reached the center square of the city. This used to be the central hub of the city, crowded with cars, flanked by trolleys, with a giant market in the middle. However, after deciding to make it car-free, it's now a quiet, beautiful little place. It was also pretty empty cause it was so damn HOT.

The square was surrounded by some beautiful older buildings of varying time periods. 

The main feature of the square is the mint-domed building in the back. Again calling back to the days when the Ottoman Turks occupied this city, this once church was converted into a mosque. When the Hungarians reclaimed the city, they converted it back into a church. But more on that later.

We wandered down some side streets admiring the architecture with its moorish influences. One of the best examples of this influence is the Hotel Palatinus. The horseshoe shaped exterior is a beautiful mix of yellows and whites and wrought iron design. 

It was home to a really cool looking wine bar. 

And the interior at reception felt like being in Turkey, not Hungary.

Some more Turkish influence along the side streets.

We came across a small square that was home to the local theater. The fountain in front of it looked so cool and refreshing in the hot sun that the entire square felt like an oasis. Even the pattern of the bricks felt like waves. 

When we'd had enough of the heat, we decided to explore the church-turned-mosque-turned-church in the square. I will say, this was a really unique building. The room was still round like a mosque, with painted domes and archways. 

However, splitting the room in half was an altar. All throughout the church, things one would typically see in a mosque were here, but had been converted into a completely different use. Behind some of the whitewashed walls, the Arabic prayers that used to adorn the walls can faintly be seen.

There was also this crazy massive organ that took up almost half the wall on the second floor. It was so big, I almost didn't see it for what it was.

Back out to brave the heat, we came upon this lock gate (another one claiming to be the first). This tradition has a slightly different use though from the typical "love locks". When students finish school nearby, it is a tradition to dump their locker locks on the gate to signify the completion of their studies. While this is meant to be reserved for students, it doesn't stop the gift shops in the area from selling locks to tourists.

Ahh, found a shady spot for our walk.

Our last stop in Pécs was at the Basilica. It was hard to capture just how massive this building was and how high the four towers went up into the air. Making this even harder was again the noticeable lack of people that normally mill about sights like this. Where is everybody? Perhaps scared away by the heat. 

Some frame of reference for how tall these towers were are the tiny people standing in the archways at the top of the tower. 

The massive square in front of the church used to be separated in two by a wall and a moat. The lower square was for the people, the higher one for the church. This statue of Bishop Szepesy was the guy who made them all one big park, and is shown stepping down off his pulpit to the people. He was also believed to be the first bishop to speak Hungarian. 

The front gate of the church was also pretty cool. Paying homage to the big money maker of the region, it was made to look like grape vines climbing up the front and topped with a dove. Even the church knew how important wine is!

Behind the church, next to the entrance was a massive line of statues of the twelve apostles. They were huge.

The interior of the church was ornately decorated, with a similar style to the other churches we've seen in Hungary with murals painted all over the walls. We took a quick gander, but time was running short and we were literally cooked.

So back to Villány we headed, and with no time to waste. We had a quick turnaround at the hotel before heading to another tasting at the Sauska wine room. When we pulled up, Dave thought it was hysterical that upon entering and asking if we could do a tasting, the owner asked if I was Courtney. I had emailed a couple weeks earlier asking if we needed to make a reservation, and this guy remembered my name. That wouldn't happen in Napa!

What was supposed to be a tasting turned into an epic lunch, coupled with their best wines, and it was fantastic. It was still so hot out that we didn't want to eat outside, but once we were done, we took a spin on their back deck to enjoy the views. 

Finally able to photograph the views I've been staring at from a car all day. It was magnificent. 

We found the house that Pam would like to live in.

Pam and Mary Kate, in their happy place.

From here, Dave, Mary Kate and I decided to walk back to town among the vineyards. It was so peaceful and beautiful. 

And back to town. 

Upon returning to town, we absolutely had to revisit our friend in her wine cave, and this time, bring Uncle Joe with us. Thankfully he could translate for us, but she told him she had an absolute blast trying to communicate with us the prior day. 

We also got to solve the mystery of her coin encrusted walls. Anyone who has visited her cellar can press their local currency into the moldy bricks, which will stick, and serve as a testament to her visitors. So we got out our coins and had a pressing party. 

That evening, we had another fantastic meal at a super local establishment (it didn't even have English menus) and finished up our time in Villány. While Pécs might have been the book entry, Villány was the clear cut winner with my wine-guzzling family. We're already planning out how to purchase a vineyard there and plan to be best friends with our cellar lady.