Margaret Island

The Musical Fountain sits at the southern end, beside the Centenary Monument, and it is the first thing you reach coming down from Margaret Bridge. The basin is 36 metres across and holds 400 cubic metres of water, 154 nozzles play across it, and the central jet goes up 25 metres. Its operator calls it the largest musical fountain in Hungary and one of the largest in Europe.

In an ordinary year it runs from 1 May to 31 October, from 10:00 to 22:00, with a block of music on the hour from 11:00 until 21:00. The 21:00 block is the one to plan around, the longest of the day and the only one with films projected onto the curtain of water. The children’s blocks are at 11:00 and 16:00.

There is a second musical water feature at the far end of the island, the Bodor Well, which plays on the hour as well, and the bus stop beside it is called Zenélőkút. Get off there for the Musical Fountain and you are 2.5 kilometres from it.

The water tower was finished in 1911 and was designed from the start to do two jobs, hold water and be climbed.

Ray Rezső Vilmos drew it and Zielinski Szilárd engineered it, and he was one of the first people in Europe to build in reinforced concrete and the man who brought the material to Hungary. It is 57 metres tall, the basin at the top held 600 cubic metres, and the main columns carry 220 tonnes each.

The climb is 153 steps, a concrete stair for the first 24 metres and an iron one for the next 20, and the gallery at the top looks down the length of the island and across both arms of the river. Since 2012 the tower has doubled as an exhibition space, and it was declared a monument of townscape significance back in 1977.

Two practical things. Only 30 people may be inside at once, so on a busy afternoon expect to wait at the bottom. And the tower publishes its hours a month at a time and closes at 18:00 on performance days, so check before you make the journey for it alone.

Béla IV founded a Dominican convent here in 1252 and his daughter Margaret moved into it at ten years old. She died on the island in 1271 and was buried in the church, pilgrims came to her grave for 250 years, and the island has carried her name ever since.

What survives is the outline: walls a metre to a metre and a half high, with parts of the sanctuary and the tower reaching about two metres, and carved Gothic window frames and mouldings among them.

Two things to look for. The red marble slab under its canopy marks where her grave stood until the sixteenth century, and beside it grows a remarkable intertwined pair of trees, a field maple and an ash grown together.

The ruins are open at any hour and cost nothing, and they are worth a slow circuit in daylight, when the carved fragments show. Two more ruined houses stand on the island, a Franciscan church dedicated to Saint Clare and a Premonstratensian chapel that holds the oldest bell in Budapest. Their story is on our history of Margaret Island.

Palatinus is the island’s lido, open since 1919 as the first bath in Budapest where you could swim outdoors, with 15 pools, four water slides and a Bauhaus building from 1937. It admits children of any age, which most of the city’s historic baths do not.

It is open every day of the year, but the wave pool, the slides and most of the outdoor pools are summer only, and in winter the hours are shorter. GetYourGuide sells a full-day admission ticket to Palatinus with free cancellation up to 24 hours ahead, and bus 26 stops outside.

Our Palatinus guide covers which pools run in which season, the hours, the slides and what to bring.

The island is 2.5 kilometres from end to end, and the local answer to that is the bringóhintó, a four-wheeled pedal car you steer from a bench. The standard one seats three adults and two small children, the family tandem six adults, and the giant tandem nine. There are also bicycles, electric bikes, go-karts, electric scooters and a tiny pedal car for pre-school children called the Picikli.

Two hire bases. Bringóvár, at the north end beside the hotels, is the main one and runs every day of the year from 09:00, with free bike storage and a buffet; get off bus 26 at Szállodák.

The second base sits by the Musical Fountain at the southern end, about 450 metres from the tram stop, and it is seasonal, opens late morning and closes in bad weather, so ring ahead or start at Bringóvár.

You pay at the end, billed by the time you use, nobody under 18 may hire without a parent or a teacher, and a hired vehicle may not leave the island.

A running track goes right round the island, named the Monspart Sarolta Futókör after the orienteering world champion. It measures about 5.3 kilometres, the surface is tartan rather than asphalt, and it is lit, which is why Budapest runners treat this island as their track rather than a park.

The rule people break is simple. Bikes are not allowed on the track. That goes for hired pedal cars too. There is a footpath alongside for walkers and a road for everything with wheels, so the three keep out of each other’s way.

Allow about an hour to walk the loop at an ordinary pace, less if you are only doing one bank. The early morning is the runners’ hour and the weekend afternoon belongs to families on wheels. Our opening hours guide sets out when the island is at its quietest.