Day Trips from Budapest: Szentendre, Esztergom and Lake Balaton

You do not need to rent a car to explore the countryside around Budapest. Two suburban HÉV lines and frequent MÁV regional trains leave straight from metro-linked stations in the city. Remember one ticket rule: your 24/72-hour Budapest-travelcard only covers the HÉV train as far as the Budapest city boundary (Békásmegyer on line H5 to Szentendre; Ilonatelep on line H8 to Gödöllő), so buy a cheap supplementary extension ticket for the outer stretch in the BudapestGO app or at the station machine before boarding.

Szentendre: the easiest half-day trip

Only 40 minutes north of Batthyány tér on the green H5 HÉV suburban train, Szentendre sits on the west bank of the Danube at the foot of the Pilis Hills. Settled in the late 17th century by Serbian, Dalmatian and Greek merchants fleeing the Ottomans, its sloping cobblestone alleys around Fő tér are painted in warm Mediterranean yellows and pinks and crowned by seven Baroque church steeples. Climb the narrow lane past the hanging lanterns to the hilltop church of St John the Baptist, visit the Ferenczy Museum or the Marzipan Museum, and from May to September return to Budapest on the afternoon Mahart passenger boat down the Danube past Margaret Island and the Parliament.

The Danube Bend: Visegrád and Esztergom

North of Szentendre, the Danube makes a right-angled turn between forested volcanic hills known as the Danube Bend (Dunakanyar):

• Esztergom: 70 minutes by modern Z72 train from Nyugati station. The seat of the Catholic Church in Hungary is crowned by the 19th-century Esztergom Basilica, Hungary's largest church, whose 100-metre dome looks across the Maria Valeria Bridge into the Slovak town of Štúrovo.
• Visegrád: take the Z70 train from Nyugati along the north bank to Nagymaros-Visegrád (50 minutes) and cross the Danube on the hourly passenger ferry right to the foot of Visegrád's medieval Lower Tower and hilltop Citadel (Fellegvár).

Gödöllő Royal Palace: Sisi's Hungarian retreat

Fifty minutes east of Örs vezér tere (the terminus of red metro line M2) on the H8 HÉV train (Gödöllő, Szabadság tér stop), the white-and-gold Grassalkovich Palace at Gödöllő is one of the largest Baroque palaces in Europe. Gifted to Franz Joseph and Empress Elisabeth (Sisi) after their 1867 coronation, it became Sisi's favourite escape from the stiff court protocol of the Vienna Hofburg.

Eger and Lake Balaton

Two hours north-east of Keleti station by direct InterRegio train, Eger pairs a hilltop castle famous for repelling the 1552 Ottoman siege and a 16th-century Turkish minaret with the Valley of the Beautiful Woman (Szépasszony-völgy), where wine cellars carved into volcanic tuff rock pour red Egri Bikavér (Bull's Blood). In late spring or summer, hourly trains from Déli station reach Balatonfüred on the north shore of Lake Balaton in under two hours, where a local bus climbs onto the volcanic Tihany Peninsula to twin-spired Tihany Abbey.