On board the cruise ship

Today we wandered around Budapest for a while, did some shopping, had lunch at Maccas. We walked along the river to Parliament House, which is a magnificent building, not unlike the British houses of Parliament. I sat down on the edge of the Danube River and put my feet in. It was cold and splashed all over me, but I had to do it. I thought, "Wow, this water has been through a whole lot of other countries before coming to my feet". It is a very busy waterway. A coal barge went past before while we were having dinner and there are lots of cruise boats.
This afternoon we came to our cruise ship. It is magnificent. It is so luxurious, I feel like a queen. It appears really new and everything is provided. We have a room with a balcony and its own bathroom. We get three meals a day; a buffet for breakfast and lunch and for dinner it is 6 courses, the best food I have ever tasted. I am going to come back looking like an elephant. They have violinists serenading you while you are eating your dinner. That was a bit weird. So much better than England and Ireland where they just deepfry everything. It is amazing. There are people to serve you for your every need. I feel a bit overindulged, but I might as well enjoy it while I can. All the guests on board are either Australian or Kiwis and they are all very friendly. We are going to go 1800km along the river to Amsterdam. Actually it is 2 rivers, the Danube we are on at the moment and later we will be on the Rhine. We have to go through 68locks to get us up the river. They are sort of like gates on the river, where they fill up the water between the two gates so you get up higher. I dont really get them. We went in some in China on the Yangtze River.
Adrian's Dad, Les and sister, Sue, arrived from Ireland tonight, just after dinner. We went for a walk along the river. The whole city is lit up and it looks like a fairyland. Its so pretty. Tomorrow we explore Budapest some more before sailing off at 6pm tomorrow to Slovakia.