Leaving Town

After the Awards Ceremony we packed everything up and drove from Debrecen to Budapest. We checked into the Airport Hotel Budapest, then piled about 20 Americans into 4 vehicles and drove back to Iguana for another round of Mexican food. We then walked around Budapest a bit, which allowed us to see St. Stephen's Basilica at night. Johnny, Mark, Andrew, and several others will fly out tomorrow morning. Of course Johnny has one more carry-on bag, which I wouldn't be surprised if he bought a seat for on the flight home.  Erica, Paul, Bonnie, Bruce and I will finish packing the balloon, drop it off at air freight, then turn in the vehicles at the Ford office. We'll have about half a day in Budapest to be tourists, then return to the Airport Hotel tomorrow night before our 7:00am departure on Tuesday.

The Airport Hotel is a little more "westernized" than where we stayed in Debrecen. The beds are a bit softer and we get a few more TV channels in English. It also has a really neat feature that I've only seen once before, in Japan. When you walk in the room you need to insert you card key to "activate" the lights, TV, furnace/AC etc. If you remove your key, everything shuts off. It's a pretty smart thing because you can't leave anything on when you exit the room, thereby saving energy (and $$$).