Festetics Palace & More

My primary destination this morning in Keszthely was Festetics Palace. But I stopped at a church along the way and took in a few museums, one in the palace grounds and two across the road, but within Kastélypark, in which the palace and its grounds lie.

The forecast high for today was a couple of degrees, but only a couple, cooler than yesterday’s brutal temperatures. As I set out this morning at about 9:30, when I was in the shade, it was only a smidgen hotter than comfortable. It was a different matter in the sun. Then, the temperature wasn’t within eyesight of being comfortable. Fortunately, I was able to stay in the shade most of the way to the palace.

Along the way, I passed Keszthely’s Fő tér. You’ll notice that it has the same weird sans-serif open quote accent over the o as in Győr. That’s not terribly difficult to type on iOS or iPadOS: Press and hold “o.” Wait for a list of available accented o options to pop up. Squint with extreme prejudice so your ancient eyes can find the correct choice among the tiny available options (that might be just me). The options include ő, among others. Choose that one.

That’s a pain, but it’s worse on a Mac. At the time of writing, MacOS didn’t offer ő as one of the accented o options. I did some hunting on the web. Apple might add it sometime after I leave Hungary, but as far as I could tell, currently, the only way to type ő on a Mac is to go into settings and change it to a Hungarian keyboard. I wasn’t prepared to do that. So when I was back at my hotel and typing journal entries on my MacBook, rather than on my iPhone, if I had to type Győr, I didn’t. I copied and pasted it from somewhere else.

I learned that “Fő tér” is Hungarian for “Main square.” I’m thrilled that when I was in Sopron on this trip, all of my tourist information sources used English for Sopron’s main square, calling it simply “Main Square.” It came up frequently in my Sopron posts. If I felt the need to type it as Fő tér every time, I might have ended my trip and returned home.

Our Lady of Hungary Church

Our Lady of Hungary Church is on one side, toward one end of Keszthely’s main square. A TripAdvisor entry led me to it. I couldn’t find much information about the church other than what’s in the TripAdvisor reviews. I have less confidence in TripAdvisor reviews’ “factual” information about sites than even other online sources, such as Wikipedia.

Speaking of Wikipedia, as of this writing, it didn’t have a page for the Our Lady of Hungary Church. But a web search turned up an image of the church on Wikipedia that doesn’t appear to be attached to an entry. The data with the image says that its description comes from Wikimedia Commons. I don’t know whether that’s a trusted source, but for what it’s worth, the description is, “The Franciscans, who settled here in 1385, began the construction of the church and convent that still stands today between 1386 and 1390.”

One of the reviewers on TripAdvisor said it’s a Gothic church and that it was completed around 1390. So, that matches, but the reviewer might have gotten that from the Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons source. That’s the problem with seemingly independent online sources. Who knows if they really are independent?

As far as the Gothic part goes, from what little I know, I believe the date fits. However, not that I’m an expert — I’m astronomically far from being an expert — but the exterior didn’t look the least bit Gothic to me. Most of the interior didn’t look Gothic either. There was little exposed stone. The walls and the ceiling of the nave were smooth and painted white. The pillars were all directly against the wall, protruding only a little, and painted a light tan colour, as were the intersecting ribs that extended from them to cross the ceiling.

The exception to the “doesn’t look like my possibly flawed understanding of Gothic” statement is the area up front, surrounding the altar. That is uncovered stone and appears to me to be quite Gothicky, to coin a word. There are some very old-looking frescoes on the walls, but they are very fragmentary now. The wall on one side of the altar has no windows. The frescoes, or what’s left of them, pretty much cover it. There are stained glass windows on the other side of the altar, but there are also fragmentary frescoes between the windows.

That same reviewer on TripAdvisor claimed that the frescoes were discovered in 1974.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that it was indeed a Gothic Church, but it had some renovations to the facade and interior since then that completely obscured the Gothicness. I further suppose that the renovations removed the obscuring renovations around the altar, but not the rest of the church.

It’s only a guess, but fortunately, I expect an expert to come around shortly and let me know if the area around the church’s altar is indeed Gothic and the rest of the church isn’t. Keep an eye on the comments for that, unless you are said expert, in which case, thank you very much for any information you choose to provide.

Other photos from Our Lady of Hungary Church:

Festetics Palace

Festetics Palace is a huge — really huge — mansion, as palaces tend to be. It’s lavishly decorated and furnished, as well-kept palaces tend to be. It’s on a large estate with other buildings, fountains, gardens, lawns and trees. Some people really know how to live, don’t they? Not everyone. But some people. And only a tiny fraction of the people who know how to live can afford it.

On a Venn diagram, the set I’m in wouldn’t intersect with the sets of “people who know how to live” and “people who can afford to live like that.” I can’t conceive of living like that, nor can I afford to.

There’s a fee to enter Festetics Palace, with a discount for seniors. (For the benefit of those who aren’t yet seniors, I’m here to tell you that there are advantages and disadvantages to being a senior. The advantages are 1) seniors’ discounts and 2) you’re not dead yet. The disadvantages are pretty much everything else. I’m sure there are one or two other advantages that I can’t think of right now. Aging’s effect on memory is one of the myriad disadvantages.)

You can buy a ticket just for Festetics Palace, or a combination ticket that includes the palace and five other exhibitions, two on the palace grounds, and the others a very short walk from it. You can buy another combination ticket that also includes another site, but I know nothing about it. The ticket seller said it’s seven kilometres away. I passed on that. I bought the palace-plus-five-exhibitions ticket.

The self-paced tour of the palace is along a roped-off, tightly controlled route through several of its rooms. However, looking at the palace from the outside, I doubt it’s all of them. There is signage in Hungarian and English in each room, explaining the function of the room (or functions if that changed over time). There are also signs cataloguing most of the paintings, furniture and furnishings in each room.

An introductory sign explained that “The Festetics family was one of Hungary’s most distinguished noble families for more than 200 years. The family members played important roles in the political, economic, academic and cultural life of Hungary. … Kristóf Festetics began the construction of the palace in Keszthely. The current building’s central, eastern wing originates from that period of construction (1745-1750).”

Subsequent generations of Festetics made additions and renovations. (“Festetics” is the family name. If I wanted to talk about multiple members of the Klebanoff family, I’d say “the Klebanoffs.” What’s the equivalent for “Festetics?” Festeticses? Or is Festetics both singular and plural? Or something else?)

It’s posing questions like these in this journal, along with other nonsense I write here, that keeps me from going to bed at a decent hour when I travel.

Festetics Palace has three consecutive adjoining sitting rooms. It’s like I always say, you can never have too many sitting rooms. Am I right?

Several separate salons are scattered throughout the palace. Ditto about never having too many salons.

There’s a two-room library that’s quite handsome and filled with books, as libraries tend to be. That is, libraries tend to be filled with books. Their handsomeness is hit or miss.

And there is a very formal dining room with lovely chandeliers.

And antichambers, and who knows what else I’m forgetting at my age?

All of the rooms are lavishly decorated and furnished. One room has a coffered wood ceiling with the family’s coat of arms in relief at its centre. The ceilings in most of the rooms are decorated in one way or another, often lavishly.

I’m not sure, but I think all of the furniture and furnishings are pieces from the time of the Festetics… Damn, again I need to know how to make a plural of that.

The name “György Festetics” was used in multiple generations, György Festetics I to IV. I can’t tell you how thrilled I am that they used the double-dot umlaut over the o in their name rather than that funny accent in Győr, so I can type it, instead of having to copy and paste the name when I’m on my MacBook.

There are three small bedrooms in a row. The middle one was for the little prince, Gyorgy Festetics IV. The bedrooms on either side were for his then-widowed mother and his nanny.

To cap off the story of the Festetics’ time in the palace, the sign in Gyorgy Festetics IV’s bedroom said, “Sadly, the years of carefree childhood ended in September 1944 when the little prince and his mother had to flee Hungary due to World War II. Gyorgy Festetics IV was only able to come back to his hometown for visits decades later.”

The palace is grand, old, and huge. That should be the focus. But I’m a practical person. Walking through it, I was plagued with the thought of how many Roombas they needed to keep it adequately vacuumed.

More photos from Festetics Palace:

Carriage Exhibition

The Carriage Exhibition is in another large building on the Palace Grounds. I don’t know what it used to be, but it’s now filled with formerly horse-drawn carriages, sleds and a couple of hearses. There are also a few vintage motor cars, some with wooden spokes on their wheels. One room held a collection of old toy cars and carriages.

I don’t have a lot to say about the collection, other than that it was impressive. Instead of another of my lengthy, tedious, sometimes inane narratives, please look at the following pictures instead. You’re welcome.

Photos from the Carriage Exhibition:

Hunting Exhibition

The Hunting Exhibition is in a museum across the road from the back end of the Festetics Palace estate. “Taxidermy Exhibition” would be a better name for it than “Hunting Exhibition.” It is mostly filled with dead, stuffed animals from around the world. That’s probably for the best because I imagine it’s much more difficult to stuff live animals.

It’s not only taxidermy. There are also a few unstuffed animal skins, antlers, skulls, and heads lying or hanging around. The exhibition also includes some displays of rifles and animal-themed items, such as small sculptures and painted plates.

The majority of the taxidermy is displayed in dioramas that group animals from the same geographical area. Sometimes, they are just standing there, but often they are set in scenes from their native lands. Some of the dioramas are quite large and wrap around. There were at least a few that were too big for me to include in a single photo, even when using the widest-angle lens my iPhone provides.

This is going to be another section where I provide more pictures than words. Again, you’re welcome.

Photos from the Hunting Exhibition:

Historical Model Railway Exhibition

As I begin to write this section, I don’t know how long it will be. I have emotions. I don’t know how long I’ll spend expressing them.

Let’s get the mechanics out of the way first. The Historical Model Railway Exhibition is upstairs in the same building that houses the Hunting Exhibition.

There are, I forget how many, functioning model railways. Each is quite elaborate, with multiple tracks and switches between them. Model trains motor slowly along them. The trains roll past model hills, mountains, villages and roads, and through a tunnel. One of the scenes is through snowy mountains. That’s where the tunnel was.

I was there for a few minutes when the overhead lights went out. I thought, “Oh, great. A power failure.” But then I noticed the trains were still running on their tracks. Seconds later, the tiny lights in the buildings on the models, along with the equally tiny streetlights on the roads, overhead lights by the tracks, and lights at the station platforms, switched on. For a few minutes, the other visitors and I observed the railways at night.

It was very cool. At least, I thought so. I don’t know how many other people would.

Which brings me to that emotional part. I don’t remember if I ever vocalized it as a child — maybe someone here remembers and can remind me — but when I was a youngster, I always loved model trains. I had a trivial little set, but I dreamed of having a huge house, with an enormous basement where I could build something like at least one of the elaborate model railways in the Historical Model Railway Exhibition, complete with the surrounding scenery.

I don’t know why I loved them. It’s not something I can explain, even to myself. They just enchanted me.

Okay. Here’s the embarrassing part. That never went away. I still love them. I still occasionally daydream of having that sort of setup. I still can’t explain it. I still don’t know why they fascinate me. But there you are.

More photos from the Historical Model Railway Exhibition: