Petőfi Sétány

The town’s approximately 3 km long Danube riverside promenade and cycling path, divided into several sections and named after its former renowned residents, is part of the Leányfalu Local Heritage Collection.

Sándor Márai (1900-1989), the writer, detailed in his book “Föld, föld!…” (Earth, Earth!…) and his diaries the years he spent here in 1944-45, describing Leányfalu during wartime.

István Bibó (1911-1979), university professor and legal scholar, often spent time in Leányfalu at the house of his father-in-law, László Ravasz, a Reformed pastor and bishop of the Danubian Reformed Church District.

Ignác Szendrey (1800-1895), father-in-law of Sándor Petőfi (1823-1849), was among the first settlers in Leányfalu, owning two houses and several acres of gardens and forest.

Ferenc Karinthy (1921-1992), Kossuth Prize-winning writer, playwright, and dramaturg, published his colorful writings in daily newspapers from March to October for three decades starting in 1963, sending them from “the center of the world,” Leányfalu.

János Szentágothai (1912-1994), Kossuth Prize-winning neuroscientist and professor of anatomy, owned the former Neruda House in Leányfalu from 1980 until his death. Even in his childhood, he regularly spent summers here with his family in a houseboat moored near Kacsa Island.

István Györffy (1912-1999), physician, professor of ophthalmology, and inventor of the contact lens, purchased a plot in Leányfalu in 1940, then built a boathouse on it, which he later converted into a summer house, establishing a nationally renowned botanical garden around it. Based on his personal knowledge, he wrote the local history of the southern part of the settlement.

György Györffy (1917-2000), Széchenyi Prize-winning historian and renowned researcher of the Hungarian Middle Ages, purchased a plot in Leányfalu in 1948. He built his Danube riverside, evocative, round, thatched-roof house in 1962.

Ilona Gombocz, daughter of botanist Professor Endre Gombocz (1882-1945), was the wife of István Györffy. Endre’s son, Zoltán Gombocz, built a house next to the Györffy plot in 1942. Zoltán’s son, Zoltán Gombocz Jr. (1942-1997), was an economist, Deputy Minister of Foreign Trade, then Deputy Minister of Commerce, Secretary of State, and Deputy Secretary of State for International Economic Relations.