August 17 – 19, 2019

After leaving Bucharest and its millions of illegally parked cars, we want to go to Craiova as a stopping point between Bucharest and Belgrade, Serbia. However, there is one more Vlad the Impaler castle we would like to visit.

During Vlad’s reign, he was in constant conflict with the Ottoman Empire. As a result of this, around 1460, he rebuilt an existing castle in the Carpathian Mountains that protected a strategic trade route through the mountains along the Arges River Valley. Who ever controlled this mountain top, controlled the trade route.

The Poenari Castle is supposed to be one of the most haunted castles in Europe. The supernatural folks love this place. We just wanted to see it because it was associated with Vlad.

However, we had a slight problem. The castle is about 2 hours north of Bucharest and we need to head straight west to get to Craiova. Oh well, what’s, another 3-4 hours of driving through the twisty, winding, narrow, heart stopping, mountain roads, along with thousands of other crazy Romanian drivers? So, we are off to see Poenari Castle.

We finally get to the castle and it is quite a sight sitting there on top of the mountain.

We illegally park our car on the side of the road (hey, it’s Romania) and head up to the ticket office. It is going to be quite a climb up the mountain by stairs. There is no road or cable car to get you up there. The only way up is to take the 1,480 step stairway. One member of the Goodell household is going to try while the other member of the Goodell household is planning to read her book in the cafe.

We get up to the gate and see this sign.

Yep, Momma bear and her 3 cubs have closed down the castle. Evidently, there have been “encounters” with the bears and tourists. So, they shut it down until she goes away. Probably until winter when she hibernates. It’s nice to see nature win one every now and then.

We are now 0 -2 for our last 2 Vlad locations. We saw the building exteriors in Bucharest and here, but couldn’t get it. This one wasn’t too disappointing. I really wasn’t looking forward to climbing 1,480 steps.

We make it to Craiova later that day and check into our hotel. The next day we are off the see the sights in Craiova. Craiova is a lot bigger than we thought. It is actually the 6th biggest city in Romania. Who knew?

We start off in their Botanical Garden, a short walk from the hotel. A very pretty park.

We also saw some wildlife, including some feisty swans.

After lunch, we drove over to the Oltenia Museum. It features the history of the Craiova area, back to the Stone Ages. Once again, we were the only people visiting this great museum. We got a private tour from one of the guides. It really is a shame that no one goes to these exhibits.

We started off with the Neolithic and archaeological items. Lots of cool bones and such.

The rest of the museum took Craiova and Romania through it’s history of kings, communism, and today.

After the museum, it was off to the Jean Mihail Palace. This former residence of one of the wealthiest men in Romania remains in superb condition. Jean passed away in 1936 with no heirs. He directed that his sizable fortune be sold and the lands and monies distributed to the people of the area. Not surprisingly, the estate administrators delayed these actions while paying themselves exorbitant salaries and not liquidizing the estate. Then in 1944 Communism came along and took everything. The Communist turned the palace into a museum, as it remains today.

All in all, a nice day wandering around this interesting city.

Map progress – Bucharest, Romania to Craiova, Romania by car.

August 14 – 17, 2019

In doing our research on Vlad the Impaler, we found that he lived near Bucharest in the town of Targoviste. He built a castle there and it was his primary residence during the 7 years he was the King of Wallachia.

The castle is in ruins, but some walls remain and a tower on the property that was built by Vlad and reconstructed by Gheorge Bibescu (Romanian King after Vlad). The tower is fully functional and can be climbed by stairs, as you will see.

Targoviste is only 75 kilometers north of Bucharest, so we head out fairly early in the morning. The grounds also house a museum for Romania books and printing press and a great old chapel.

After the museum and chapel, we move on to the good stuff, the ruins of Vlad the Impaler’s castle.

The primary attraction of the Royal Court is the tower, known as Chindia Tower. It has 127 steps to the top. Guess which member of the Goodell household made it to the top?

We ticked another Vlad the Impaler item off of our list and went on the explore the rest of the sights of Targoviste. These included the Romanian Police National Museum (the only police museum in Romania) and the Art Museum. Both of them were housed in very interesting buildings, especially the Art Museum. We were the only people in them for each venue. Really a shame for such nice exhibits.

The last item in Targoviste that we wanted to see was the Communist Museum. As you may know, Romania was under Communist rule from 1947 to 1989. Nicolae Ceausescu gained control of the Communist Party and the country in 1965 as it’s second Communist leader. After an initial easing of restrictions that gained him short term popularity, he instituted the totalitarian government control that eventually led to his downfall, and execution.

We thought we were going to see a historical representation of the Communist rule of Romania. What we saw was the building where Nicolea Ceausescu, and his wife Elena, were arrested and held during the Romanian Revolution of 1989, tried for their crimes, and executed.

In December 1989 a series of revolts by the Romanian people and the firing upon, and many deaths, of protesters in Timisoara, as ordered by Ceausescu,led to the overthrow of the Communist Party and the regime of Ceausescu. The Ceausescus fled Bucharest on December 22, 1989 by helicopter. The pilot landed the helicopter in Targoviste, claiming that the military, which had now changed sides, was going to shoot them down. The Ceausescus then commandeered several private cars and drivers, trying to escape capture. Each time the driver eventually forced them out of the car. Eventually they were captured by the local Targoviste police and turned over to the new government representative, General Victor Stănculescu .

In looking back on this, it seems quite evident that the Ceausescus could not drive a car. Why else would they commandeer these vehicles and not just steal one to get away? Did they get captured simply because neither one of them could drive a car?

The following photos show the rooms where the Ceausescus were held, tried, and then executed. Pretty grisly stuff. Well worth the 16 Lei ($4.00) we paid to see it.

Their trial lasted 1.5 hours. They were charged with economic sabotage and genocide. Prior to the trial, General Stănculescu had hand picked this location and placed a squad of paratroopers in place for the execution. Talk about a shot gun trial. Not saying they didn’t deserve it, but boy it went quick.

Five minutes after the Csausescus were found guilty, they were led outside to the back of the building and placed against a brick wall. They were then executed by firing squad.

This Communist Museum was really cool. You hear about revolutions, beheadings, executions, etc. all through out history. Very interesting to see the actual well preserved site of the removal of a dictator. The Romanian people are very proud of this site and their revolution. We saw several monuments to the 1989 revolution in Bucharest and other towns. The guy at the tourist center in Targoviste specifically told us to go to this museum to see the execution site.

After Targoviste we headed back to Bucharest. We decided to try to find Vlad the Impaler’s Old Fortress one more time. Well, we sort of found it.

It is actually named Curtea Viche (Old Princely Court), not the Old Fortress as the article we read said. It turns out it does exist, but is under renovation and behind a construction fence. Oh well, at least we finally found it. Another item off the Vlad list, even if we couldn’t go inside.

Then of course, off to dinner.

On the walk back to the apartment, we came across a statue of a classic Roman myth.

Map progress – none, still in Bucharest.

August 14 – 17, 2019

We continued to head south the next day out of Sinai, Romania. We say goodbye to the museum/hotel and drive into the big city of Bucharest.

We have another Airbnb here. As the drive down from Sinai is actually pretty quick for a change, we arrive several hours before the stated 3PM check in time. We tried to contact the owner to get an earlier check in, but did not get a response.

Once we arrived we were primarily concerned about where to park. We found the apartment building. But, there were only 5 spots in front of the building, all occupied. The owner had stated in her ad for Airbnb that free parking was guaranteed. We couldn’t see any designated areas. However, we did see cars parked all over the place, and I mean everywhere. We wound up finding a public parking garage underneath the Inter Continental Hotel a few blocks away and parked our Renault there. We then hung out in the lobby bar until 2:55 PM when our host finally responded that we could check in.

We meet our little want-a-be hippie host at the door to the building and asked her about the parking. She smiles and happily explains that you just park anywhere you want. No one cares. So, free parking is included with the apartment. Well, we aren’t so sure about that. The apartment is fine though, we are now 8 – 2 for Airbnbs. We settle in a bit and head out to see the Old Town and grab some dinner.

On the way, we immediately see what she is talking about regarding parking anywhere you want.

We decide to keep our space in the parking garage until our last day when a spot opens up in front of the building.

Old Town is about a 10 minute walk away from the apartment. As Bucharest was first pretty much destroyed during World War II and then by the Communist Party under the control of Nicholas Ceausescu, there is no fortress or walls or anything similar in the Old Town Section. Just pedestrian streets and your usual shops, restaurants, and bars.

We find a great place for dinner with an unusual way to entice customers in. Once inside, the food and entertainment was excellent!

After dinner, on the walk back to the apartment, we noticed an unusual establishment with some strange hours.

Huuuuuum, seems to be an awful lot of Gentleman’s Clubs in Eastern Europe!

The next day we head out of the city a bit to see Mogosoaia Palace. The palace was originally built by Constantine Brancoveanu, the Prince of Southern Romania, between the years 1698 – 1702. It has been destroyed several times by the best of the various invading forces throughout history including; the Ottoman Empire. It always managed to get a new owner who would reconstruct it in time for the next war.

The current palace is the result of the work of Martha Bibescu. She acquired the palace as a gift from her husband shortly before World War I. She then reconstructed and renovated the palace from 1915 to 1935. When the Communists took over Romania in 1948 they confiscated all privately owned property, including the palace. Martha was forced to flee the country. The Communists turned the palace into a museum, as it remains today. It houses some contemporary art, some traditional pieces, and more importantly, a collection of frescoes taken from the Vacatresti Monastary. This monastery in Bucharest was destroyed by the order of Communist Party Leader Nicolea Ceausescu in 1989, purely on a personal whim. Private citizens managed to save these frescoes before the building was totally demolished.

Now, the Mogosoaia palace and the grounds are a very popular place for Bucharest families to picnic and frolic about during the summer months and on the weekends.

The grounds also include a private family chapel that was also built by Constantine Brancoveanu. The chapel features some amazing artwork painted directly on the walls and ceilings. They are not really frescoes, but actual paintings.

The art museum inside the palace.

After visiting the palace and grounds we head back to Bucharest. We have been doing more research on Vlad the Impaler and are trying to see more sites where he lived, or had an impact.

One site that we discovered is actually in Old Town Bucharest. There is an Old Fortress in Bucharest that Vlad built and used as a residence while in the area. After returning to the apartment we set off on foot to try to find it.

We did not find it (more on that in a later post). However, we did get to Urinii Square (Union Square in English) where the Old Fortress was supposed to be located. Once there we found this amazing system of fountains in the square and in the streets surrounding it.

We couldn’t find the Old Fortress (today), but settled for a nice dinner at an Irish Bar and headed back to the apartment. More adventures tomorrow.

Map progress – none, still in Bucharest.

August 12 – 14, 2019

After we got down off the mountain top at Bucegi Nature Park on Tuesday afternoon, we headed back to Sinai to see the Peles Castle. The nice old guy at the visitor center had told us yesterday that the castle itself was closed on Tuesday, but we could see, and wander around, the castle grounds. Andrea had also checked on their website and it said the castle was closed on Tuesdays. We figured we would at least see the grounds and exterior, which were supposed to be very impressive.

Of course when we got there, we found out that the castle was indeed open on Tuesday, just like all of their signage said it would be. These Romanians just can’t get their information straight.

King Carol I of Romania was the first Romanian king. He ruled the country from 1866 to 1914. He commissioned the castle to be built in 1873. It was completed several years later, with many additions and improvements made to the castle up until the king’s death in 1914.

The interior of the castle features exquisite wood carvings and wood works through out the buildings. Most of the previous castles we have seen have been older and focused on stone works and stone statues. The Peles Castle features wood, fabrics, glass, rugs, and armaments, with the occasional marble statue.

One kind of amusing side note has to do with the pictures we took inside the castle. We started shooting pictures right from the start and the tour guide quickly told us we had to pay a fee to take pictures. OK, we have seen this before in other sites. You pay about $5.00, they give you a sticker, or receipt, and you take all the pictures you want. We told the guide fine, we will pay the fee. Where do we do this? She rudely points to outside and says go back to the ticket counter. Which, of course we can’t do as the tour has already started.

Andrea starts to sneak a few pictures (as other people are doing) and gets accosted by a lady security guard who demands to see her photo pass. Andrea explains we didn’t know that we had to buy one (all in sign language by the way, the guard speaks no English), but will do so gladly if we can purchase it inside the building. The guard goes 10 feet back to her station, grabs a receipt book, collects 10 LEI from Andrea, clips a receipt on her camera strap and we are good to go. The tour guide kind of glares at us.

Fifteen minutes later, I get accosted by the same guard who has forgotten that she sold us the photo pass. I point out the pass on Andrea’s camera strap and she goes off looking for another victim. Oh well, you got to generate revenue somehow.

We got to the library and are informed by the tour guide that there is a secret door in the library. It links the king’s bedroom with the library so he could go up and down in private.

All in all, this is a very beautiful castle in excellent condition. I hope they can keep it maintained for generations to come.

Map progress – none, still in Sinai.

August 12 – 14, 2019

Well, we didn’t meet Dracula or any of his friends in Bran Castle or Brasov. So, it’s time to keep moving on. We headed south to Sinai, Romania, expecting a short 1.5 hour drive from Brasov. Yeah, right.

We knew that when we were planning this trip, that the months of July and August are the heart of the European tourist season. We purposely booked hotels and Airbnbs well in advance so we wouldn’t get stuck one night with no place to stay. That part has worked out perfectly.

What we did not figure on was the traffic and number of local Romanians (and other countries citizens) just taking day trips and visiting the same sites as we are. Traveler’s tip, avid reader, hotel rooms, fine. Roads and places to visit get very, very, crowded.

Our 1.5 hour trip took about 3.5 hours. The 2 hour delay was getting through the town of Busteni, Romania. This little town is the starting point for either the gondola ride to the top of the mountain in Bucegi Nature Park, or a spot to hire a ride from a local entrepreneur to drive you to the top of the mountain (more on that later). It is also full of little souvenir shops, bars, etc, but they are just there because of the crowds going to Bucegi Nature Park.

Our destination town of Sinai is about 15 kilometers further south, down the only mountain road to get to Sinai, which is through Busteni. Once we got past Busteni, it only took us 15 minutes to get into town and find our hotel.

You know the movie “A Night at the Museum”? We beat that. We spent 2 nights in a museum. Yep, our little hotel is based out of a local museum, also known as Stirby Castle, featuring the history of Sinai. The museum/hotel is in a summer home built in 1875 by General I.E. Flourescu. The house was named Alina Stirby Villa, after his wife. It was bought by a local business person and turned into a museum and hotel in 2015.

We have a very small little room in the top floor. We are one of 6 rooms. We actually had the whole upstairs all to ourselves, which was kind of cool as the other rooms were vacant. The top floor with the rooms also had a common area with furniture, fridge, TV etc., that we just took over. Definitely one of our more unusual locations to stay on this trip, if not ever.

Oh yeah, they even have their own personal bobsled. We gotta come back in the winter and try that!

We finally settled into our room and went out to grab dinner and explore this quaint little town. We know we want to see the Bucegi Nature Park and the Peles Castle. We just aren’t sure how to do that before we have to leave town, so we stop in at a local tourist information center. The old guy there is very nice, speaks great English, and goes to great length to explain how 9 million people in a country of 20 million (Romania) are now on vacation. He says the local towns are overwhelmed with all the tourists (including us evidently). We ask about the operating hours for the Bucegi gondola and the Peles Castle. He says the gondola starts at 9AM on Tuesday (August 13th, the next day) and the Peles Castle is closed on Tuesday, but you can visit the grounds.

OK, we decide to get our butts out of bed at 6:30 AM and be one of the first in line for the Bucegi gondola. We figure we can be there by 8 AM for the 9 AM first trip.

This is not usual for us. We have settled in to a very nice routine of getting up when ever we feel like it, which is definitely not 6:30 AM every day. Lets just say we average 9 AM to 10 AM with we, being the royal we. Andrea is usually up before me.

We do exactly as planned and are getting in line for the gondola by 8 AM. There are already 30 people in line before us. OK, no biggy. We knew we were going to have to wait. Then this local guy with a map shows up and starts yammering at us in Romanian. We tell him we don’t understand and start to walk on by. He then shifts to English and asks if we know that Tuesday is maintenance day for the gondola, and the first ride isn’t until 10:30 AM, 2.5 hours away? Andrea thought that might have been the case, because it was mentioned on their website. However, the nice old dude at the information center had told us 9 AM. What a surprise. Misinformation in Romania!

Anyway, the guy says that for 50 LEI ($12.50) each, his driver guy will take us to the top of the mountain. From there we take a 30 minute hike on the mountain top to get to the gondola base to get back down to Busteni, and our car. We could also see the rock formations we wanted to see on the hike to the gondola. Andrea looks at him and quite clearly says “OK, 30 minutes, but how many hills do I have to go up?”. He says, “No problem, it is very flat up there.”. The cost of the gondola ride is 45 LEI, practically the same as his 50 LEI, so we say OK. Ten minutes later, us and 4 other people are crammed into some kind of Russian SUV on the way up to the top of the mountain.

The drive is a normal,narrow, twisty, drive up the mountain top. Same thing we have done several times so far. However, our driver guy knows the secret path off the road to get us to a staging point for hikers near the top (near being a relative term). The drive takes an hour. It is a long way up to the top of that mountain. At the top, we are at 2,500 meters above sea level. That is 1.5 miles high, about 7,500 feet.

We get out of the car and he points down this road/trail thingy and says “The gondola is that way. About a 45 minute walk.”. OK, the guy below said 30 minutes. He says 45 minutes. How long is this really going to take? Take a guess avid reader. Take a good guess. We won’t even talk about hills yet.

So, we head off down the road/trail thingy.

We finally make it to the top of the mountain where the gondola building is. It takes us 1.25 hours. As we got closer to the gondola house, the incline just kept getting harder. But, we made it. We grabbed some lunch in the snack bar. Andrea decided to rest up and I went up a little further to explore the rock formations. They were pretty cool. The view from the top is amazing.

We hop on the gondola. It is quite a ride down. You come down off a 7,500 foot high mountain and the decent is pretty dramatic.

It took us an hour for the drive up. Another 1.25 hours to hike up the side of the mountain to reach the gondola base and the rock formations.

It took us 15 minutes to ride down in the gondola. All in all, a very good trade off. Yeah, we could have waited the 2.5 hours to take the gondola up, but then we wouldn’t have such a good story and seen the sights along the way.

Oh yeah, when we started back down to the car, we got a bit of a chuckle from some of the local boys getting a ride to work.

Map progress – Brasov, Romania to Sinai, Romania by car.

August 8 – 12, 2019

After we got back to the apartment from Bran Castle, we started to discuss the next day’s activities. Who wants to do what and how? I voted for the Rasnov Fortress and the Valea Cetatii Cave. Andrea had no other alternatives, so we figured these would be the two options.

Then Andrea figured out that there were hills, not to mention a mountain, to walk up and decided to stay in Brasov for the day. Refer back to other posts that mention “ain’t climbing any more f’ing hills”. So, I went solo to these places.

There is a tram that goes from the Old Town in Rasnov up to the top of the mountain where the fortress is. I read about it and we actually saw it on the way back from Bran. My plan was to drive to town, find the tram station, and take that to the top to visit the fortress. Well, sometimes plans don’t always work out.

I get into town, just about a 20 minute drive from Brasov. I find a nice quiet little side street with lots of parked cars and plant the Renault there for free. So far so good. I walk back to the main road and see a sign that says Incline Elevator, 500 meters, with an arrow pointing down the street. I start walking down the street, see the tram on the hill and can’t figure out how to get to the bottom of the tram rail. It looks like it is behind all the buildings that I am walking around. So, I go back to the sign and figure it must mean up the street, not across the street. Seems logical, right?

Well, maybe not. I go up the street, up a very steep hill, which still makes sense to me since we had to climb a hill in Brasov to get to the cable car, and after a bit, wind up in a large parking lot with lots of buildings etc. I think I am in the right place. Wrong. I have walked around the back side of the mountain and reached the base of the mountain on the other side of the fortress. I can see the top of the fortress, no tram. All of the activity is due to another shuttle system that takes you up the hill to either the fortress or a Dinosaur Amusement Park. Today is Sunday. The place is full of families and kids. Most are going to see the dinosaurs, which is fine with me. I start to walk up the hill, then stop and ask one of the shuttle drivers, as he is parked to fill up his shuttle, how far is it to the castle. He says 1 kilometer, then he got that – OK, old guy, probably American tourist look in his eye and said “It only costs 5 LEI”. OK, for $1.25 I’ll sit in the shuttle with the kids and not kill myself walking up the mountain. I could have done it. Probably just as well that I didn’t. By the way, these shuttles are open air carts like at Disney World, but they are pulled by huge tractors. Yeah, it’s quite a climb up the mountain.

At the top of the mountain, I get in line to buy the entry ticket for the fortress. Again, not very expensive. It costs 15 LEI ( $3.75) to buy a ticket. Actually buying the ticket is the issue.

There are probably 75 people in line for the one cashier ticket counter. I get about 20 people away from said ticket counter and the line just stops. No one is moving. What the heck is going on? One local guy walks up to investigate and comes back pissed off and yelling at the crowd. He is telling them that the one ticket clerk has decided it is time for her smoke break and is just sitting in the booth, happily smoking away, and not selling tickets. A Romanian guy translates for me and a couple of other English speaking people what is going on. Everyone is mad. Nothing we can do about it. Twenty minutes later (I guess standard break time for a Romanian ticket seller) and the line starts moving again. Unbelievable. It’s bad when not only I, stupid tourist, am pissed off. But the local Romanians are just as mad, if not more.

I finally get my ticket, get through the gate and am on my way to explore the fortress. It is not a bad place to walk around. It is no Bran Castle or Dobrovnik, but it was worth the hassle to get it.

The exterior walls are all intact. The top side of the fortress is pretty deteriorated, but you can walk around to most parts of it. Emphasis on most parts.

The bottom part of the fortress has either survived better, or they have reconstructed it. There are functional buildings down there with a couple of shops. If you need a new battle axe, this is the place to come to.

All in all, a nice little fortress. Worth a visit if you are in the area.

The one good thing about my original screw up with the tram is that now I am very close to my next destination, the Valea Cetatii Cave. The nice lady at the information center at the fortress shows me a map and how to get there. I am only about 1.5 kilometers away from it, from the parking lot down at the bottom of the mountain. Of course, the car is parked the other way from where I need to go now. Right out of the parking lot, not left. So, I hoof it back to the car and drive up the hill in search of the cave.

When researching the cave, all I saw on their official website was pretty pictures, information about concerts they have in the cave and the daily opening hours. However, after reading a couple of reviews, something became very clear very quickly. The reviews all said that you had to park in a parking lot off the road to get to the cave. They also said that the 450 meter walk up the side of the mountain was very pretty, but also pretty demanding. FYI, this is the part where I lost Andrea last night.

Well, the guy that wrote the review was accurate. You literally climb the side of the mountain through a series of steps and a pathway. All the signs leading you to the cave tell you to take this path. What they do not tell you is the gravel road that you don’t take at the bottom by the parking lot, because the sign says not to take it, is a bit easier than the crumbling steps and tree root infested pathway. Bottom line, I took their path up and the gravel road down. Trust me, the road is no picnic either going up or down. The incline is pretty severe. But the footing is much better.

One interesting point about the cave entrance. In the video you see the pretty sophisticated gate system that they have to secure the entrance. When you pay for admission, they give you a token, not a paper ticket. Obviously you are supposed to put the token into the slot to get the door to open for you.

When the guide showed up to start the tour, he goes to the side door and just opens it and starts collecting the tokens by hand from people. He says something and everyone starts laughing. I assume he said that their super duper gate system is broken and he is the official gate keeper. At least he had sense enough to count the coins to get a head count. I could at least understand that much.

We start the tour with a briefing in Romanian. I assume that he says “if you die in here, it’s not our fault”. The rest of the tour in the cave is very interesting. Although the cave system is quite small, just a few passageways and one very large room, they have done a great job with stairs, walkways, and lighting.

After the tour, I head back down the mountain, via the road this time. I drive down to Rasnov, park the car on the same little street where I did not get a parking ticket in the morning, and head off to Old Town looking for a restaurant for a late lunch/early dinner.

I wander around the cool Old Town square a bit.

I find the Lust Caffe and pop my head in for a minute. Unfortunately it was just a bar, no food.

Then, of course, I find the darn tram, just past the Lust Caffe. Why don’t they just use that as a landmark? Pretty easy to find then. Kind of like the Kaunas archive building is right behind the Strip Club.

I thought about taking it up, just for the ride, but it was kind of short, not like the cable car on Tampa Mountain. Then I found a nice little restaurant and after lunch, headed back to Brasov.

All in all a nice day wandering about the town of Rasnov.

Map progress – none, still in the Brasov, Romania area.

August 8 – 12, 2019

Bran Castle was high on our list of places to visit as we were planning our Eastern European itinerary earlier this year. Hey, it’s a really cool castle. Dracula lived there. Maybe we can meet a vampire.

Actually, the real history is not quite as compelling as the legend and folklore. As most people know; the novel Dracula was written by Bram Stoker in 1897 in England. Stoker used Bran Castle as the inspiration of the description of Dracula’s castle in his novel. Stoker never actually visited Romania, but got a description of the castle from a book written in 1865 by Charles Boner. Boner’s book “Transylvania, it’s product and it’s people” contained a section that described various castles in Romania. The description in Stoker’s book matches exactly the Bran Castle as described by Boner.

While Stoker steadfastly stated that his Dracula character was totally fictional, there are a few similarities to a Transylvanian king, Vlad Tepes. Vlad II ruled Wallachia, a large area consisting of what is now Romania and Moldova. His castle was near the Brasov area. His kingdom included the town of Bran and Bran castle. His father, Vlad I, was known as Vlad Dracul (Dracul meaning Order of the Dragon). This was an honor bestowed upon him by Sigismund, the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.

Vlad Tepes (Vlad II, son of Vlad Dracul), also known as Vlad the Impaler, ruled from 1546 to 1462. He liked to impale his enemies and criminals. Impaling is placing a person on top of an 8 foot tall sharpened spike, up through the crotch, and letting the spike work its way up through the person’s internal organs and eventually out of their head. Not a pleasant way to go. He did this to thousands of people.

Vlad the Impaler was actually imprisoned in Bran Castle for several months after his deposition by the Hungarian king, Matei Corvin, in 1462. The rest of the Dracula legend seems to come from local folklore about vampires and the undead. In any event, Dracula is known world wide through Stoker’s novel.

One interesting note about this legend and the local Romanian people. They don’t talk about it. They don’t even really promote the Transylvanian area. There is one Bank of Transylvania, and a telephone company using the name, but they are just using the name Transylvania due to the fact that is the name of the geographic region. Bran Castle and the immediate town of Bran is about the only place in Romania where we saw Dracula, the legend, marketed and promoted. It just isn’t around anywhere else. Remember, these Romania people literally believed in the undead until just the middle 1900’s. I guess they don’t want to provoke the evil spirits.

Bran Castle was originally built in 1211 by the Teutonic Knights of Palestine. The castle has undergone many changes due to destruction and reconstruction in the last 700 years. As it currently exists, it was remodeled by Queen Maria of Romania in the early 1920’s. Queen Maria was an Englishwoman of royal birth, the Princess of Edinburgh, who married King Ferdinand I of Romania. She added some English touches to it, including an English garden, that still exists today. She also brought over the tradition of 4PM tea time, that is still going on today.

We took the advice of one of our own traveler’s tip (can you guess which one, avid reader?) and bought our tickets on line the night before we went. Pretty smart, don’t you think?

This way we avoided the hour and half wait in the ticket line and got lucky and just walked right into the castle, with virtually no wait. When we left later that afternoon, the line was way down the hill, just to get into the castle, after they bought tickets.

The castle is fully furnished with pieces from the late 1800’s to early 1900’s, in line with Queen Maria’s time. The old furniture is fantastic. The nooks and crannies of the castle are a lot of fun also.

The stair ways were definitely twisty, winding, and narrow. I can imagine a kid growing up in the castle having a great time running all through it, causing all kinds of havoc.

As we were winding our way through the castle, we went by a room that was blocked off by a red rope, meaning no entry. However, there were people inside looking at obvious instruments of torture. Why were they in there and we couldn’t get in? There was even a guard there. After we finished up in the courtyard, the mystery was explained.

Then we saw this sign.

Yeah baby, medieval instruments of torture. Cool. How do we get there?

Turns out you have to pay a separate admission charge to get access into the secret room with the red rope. It is only 10 LEI ($2.50) each, so we are in. We buy the tickets, go back up the stairs like salmon swimming upstream against all of the people, get to the red rope, give the lady our tickets, and we are in.

This place is amazing. It is many rooms filled with devices to torture people to get confessions out of them. Pretty much, once you got arrested in the middle ages for being a witch, adulterer, thief, whatever, they tortured you until they got a “confession”. Then, if you hadn’t already died from the torture, they executed you. Pretty simple and gruesome.

These are just samples of the items in these rooms. It took us 20 minutes just to walk through them. An awful lot of thought and design went into these things. All in the name of “justice”.

I did notice Andrea spending a lot of time near the hot pokers and testicle pliers section. I had to keep moving her along.

All in all, a very fun day with a castle that definitely met, and then exceeded, our expectations.

Map progress – none, still in the Brasov area.

August 8 – 12, 2019

We headed south out of Bistrita, Romania with Brasov, Romania as our destination. Brasov is actually going to be one of the highlights of our Eastern European road trip. Next to Brasov is Bran Castle, which was the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Remember, we are still in Transylvania and all the legends about Dracula surround this area. More on that later.

One interesting note; on our way into and out of Bistrita we saw many sculptures of apples in the main highway median. They represented the various kinds of apples as they were all colored differently. Kind of like driving down the fruit isle in your local grocery store.

We have no idea why these sculptures are in the medians. There were probably 20 that we saw, both in town and outside of town. No explanation of why they are there, even when we tried to research it for this post. Oh well, they are kind of pretty and will remain a mystery, I guess.

We arrive at our Airbnb, located on the outskirts of town, and are now 7 – 2 for Airbnbs. This is a one bedroom apartment in a new building on the 7th floor. No air conditioning, but we bought a fan a few weeks ago that has come in very handy. Mark that traveler’s tip down, avid reader. If you travel Europe in the summer, bring a nice little fan with you.

Although our primary reason for coming to Brasov was to visit Bran Castle, outside of town, the town itself is still pretty interesting. It has the same history as the other small cities of this part of the world. It was settled thousands of years ago and more recently in the 1300’s became a major trade route for Europe from the Ottoman Empire. It has the required fortress, churches, and also has a mountain right outside of town. It is named Tampa Mountain.

As Andrea and I lived in Tampa, Florida for about 20 years, the name is obviously interesting to us. In trying to determine the origin of the name Tampa, it seems that it is probably derived from a Latin work, tamp, meaning a mountain or hill with an abrupt descent. Tampa Mountain definitely meets this description.

Going up to the summit of Tampa Mountain is one of the main attractions in Brasov. They even have their name on top of it, like the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles.

There are 2 ways to get to the top. You can walk the trail up the steep, rocky, narrow path for 950 meters. Or, you can take the cable car! Guess which option we took?

The cable car only costs about $4.00 per person, round trip, to ride. Pretty reasonable price in any country. It’s a pretty good ride up there. It takes about 2 1/2 minutes. Much better than the 30 minute hike up the hill.

As usual, the website for the summit of Tampa Mountain tells you that the view is spectacular and well worth the trip. As we have begun to learn about Romanian websites; sometimes they exaggerate or just plain lie. This one is a bit of an exaggeration.

The view of the city and valley below is spectacular as you are going up the cable car.

However, once you reach the summit, you really can’t see any of the valley below, or any sights.

The reason you can’t see anything from the top is quite simple. All of the trees are in the way. They are so tall, they block your view of the city and valley below. This is kind of a good and bad thing.

The good part is is that the mountain is a nature preserve. There are many types of birds, insects, and animals here (especially butterflies) that they are trying to protect. So, the trees are their habitat, don’t cut them down.

The bad part is that you really can’t see anything once you get off the cable car. There is a restaurant building next to the cable car terminal that has a sitting area that looks out over the mountain. However, it is closed. Based on the cracks in the concrete and obvious structural deterioration, it is probably a very good thing that it is closed.

So, very cool ride up. Spend 15 minutes wandering around (there aren’t even any bathrooms) and head back down to the city.

The City of Brasov is really a very quaint and nice city. The Old Town has preserved it’s heritage, and is actually using most of the old buildings. A lot of the other cities we have visited have not maintained the older buildings and have discontinued using them.

Of course, you have your fortress area.

Then there is Europe’s smallest street. It is an actual street, not an alley way. It is named Rope Street. The legend is that Vlad the Impaler used to live near the area of Rope Street (back in the 1700’s). He had a niece that he kept an eye on and gave her a curfew of when to be back home. She would occasionally be late (typical teenager, even back then). The legend is that she had her staff create Rope Street so that she could have a short cut to get home quicker at night. Who knows if it is true? Still, it is a good story.

All in all, a nice day spent in a very nice town.

Map progress – Bistrita, Romania to Brasov, Romania by car.

August 6 – 8, 2019

We decided to change our travel priorities a bit and explore some of Romania’s vast and beautiful mountains and countrysides. We headed north from Sibiu, Romania directly into the Carpathian Mountains. We are still in Transylvania and are checking mirrors on a regular basis, trying to catch a vampire.

One kind of funny note is that once we have hit this area, the local roadside vendors all of a sudden started selling a lot of onions and garlic. When have you ever seen these items sold at a roadside stand? Only in Transylvania.

We had done some research on this area about a week, week and a half ago, as we were planning our Romanian itinerary. There are several huge national parks in this part of Romania. The Calimani National Park featured rock formations caused by a volcanic eruption in the area about 50,000 years ago. It created a 6 mile wide caldera. In comparison, the caldera I walked around in Santorini, Greece, was about 1/2 mile in circumference. The Calimani National Park website showed these great rock formations, a waterfall, lakes and all kinds of cool things to see. There seemed to be some hiking involved, but hey. It’s a national park. You have to walk around a bit, right?

Time for a traveler’s tip avid reader. Be careful of trips into foreign countries national parks. They aren’t always as advertised.

As this park is way in the middle of the mountains, there really weren’t many places to stay close to the park. So, we picked Bistrita, which we thought was only about 40 kilometers away from the park. That turned out not to be the case.

First of all, the main center of the park turned out to be 96 kilometers away. The 40 kilometer mark was just the southern border of the park. Nothing to see there but trees.

Now 96 kilometers, about 60 miles, doesn’t seem too bad of a drive, right? OK, refer back a couple of paragraphs where it says the park is in the middle of the mountains. Mountains mean narrow, twisty, winding roads through the hills and dales and beyond. Bottom line, 96 kilometers took me 2 1/2 hours to drive. The drive was absolutely gorgeous, but very, very slow. Not to mention the closed roads through one little town.

A couple of very cool things to see along the way were a lot of storks and a lot of horse drawn farmer’s trailers. These were work in progress trips for the farmers like they have been doing for hundreds of years. Only now, they have to contend with cars, trucks, and nosy tourists like me. They didn’t seem to mind though.

Oh by the way. Have you picked up on the “it took me 2 1/2 hours to drive”, singular, not plural? Andrea decided to take a vacation day and not hike through the mountains and up and down hills all day with me. She actually made a very wise decision.

The darn GPS finally got me to the welcome center. The last mile was literally a dirt road through a farmers field.

To add insult to injury, when I left the welcome center about 20 minutes later, that road at the end of their driveway was the same darn road I was on before! The stupid GPS went right by the main entrance and took me on a 3 mile route past the entrance, up the hill, onto the farmer’s road for no reason at all. I hate GPS.

Now remember the part I mentioned before about having to do a little hiking. Hey, it’s a park you have to walk around a bit. Turns out, “a little hiking” is not in the picture.

I met the welcome center guy, who is very nice and speaks pretty good English. I explain that I would like to see the 12 Apostles (a major rock formation), the volcanic formations, and the lake. He looks me up and down and says “Well, the easy one is the 12 Apostles. That is a 6 hour round trip hike from the top visitor center, not from here.” He then points out their map with the various trails and projected hiking times to see all of these beautiful spots that are on their website. The other trails are anywhere from 15 to 20 hour round trip hikes, from the top welcome center. I am at the bottom one.

Their website never mentioned anything about these distances or the fitness required to get to these spots. Silly me, I assumed I could drive up to the welcome center, hike out a mile or so and see nature’s glory in the heart of the Carpathian Mountains. Not to be.

So then I ask the guy “Well, what can I see in a day?”, leaving the 66 year old American guy part unspoken between us. He says “You can explore the bog next to the welcome center.” I think, no thanks, a bog is a swap. Not fun at all.

Then he says, “Or you can see the sulphur mine at the top welcome center. Here it’s all on this map”.

I say “OK, how long will it take me to drive there?”

He says “About 30 minutes.”

OK, I think. I just drove 2 1/2 hours to get here. I just saw a really cool salt mine a couple of weeks ago. Maybe this will be just as interesting. What’s another 30 minutes?

Now, even as I was making this decision it crossed my mind, as I am sure it has yours, avid reader, why would there be a sulphur mine in the middle of a national park? Good question, I never could find an answer.

As I start to leave he says “You know you have to pay the park admission fee, right?”. I said, “OK, where do I pay and how much?”. He says “You pay me here, 6 Lei.”

6 Lei is about $1.50. I paid the money, he writes me out an admission ticket and says “Just show this to my colleague when you get to the top.”

OK, I’m paid up and legal. Time to leave. Back on the same road I was on before, no less.

As I head on down the road, it suddenly hits me. Hey, this road is full of farms, houses, and businesses. How in the world can this be a national park?

It turns out that this welcome center is not even in the park. It is 10 kilometers from the park entrance. From there, it just keeps getting stranger and stranger.

So far, the roads I have been on have been the typical mountain 2 lane roads we have traveled throughout Eastern Europe. They may have small pot holes, they may have lane closures, but at least they are passable, unless completely closed of course.

As soon as I entered the park, that totally changed. They sanctioned this park in the 1990’s. They must have built the roads then and never maintained them. At times I wished I was back on the farmers road it was so bad. The road was set in concrete and not asphalt. So over the years it has deteriorated into broken slabs, pot holes, and washed away in areas.

After an hour, not the 30 minutes the welcome center guy said it would take. I finally reach the top and the sulphur mine.

At the top, not only is there no “colleague” to check on my park admission ticket. There is no welcome center at the top at all. There is a parking lot for the hikers to organize from, and oh yeah, the famous sulphur mine.

Yeah, basically they dug a huge hole in the top of the mountain and hauled away the sulphur. It does not appear to be in operation any more.

No exciting mining activity, or sculptures, or even a factory. Just a big , fat, hole in the ground. However, once you get away from the big, fat, hole in the ground, it really is very pretty up there.

So what do you do at the top of the mountain? Well, you have to go down, of course. Yep, an hour down the hill, about 2 hours back to Bistrita (I missed the closed roads so saved a bit of time), got some lunch along the way and got back to the hotel to tell my sad story to Andrea. Hey, at least she didn’t laugh in my face. I did get a “poor Honeybear”.

Map progress – Sibiu, Romania to Bistrista, Romania by car.

August 4 – 6, 2019

We headed out of Arad, Romania cruising along highway A1 on our way to Sibiu, Romania. We picked this town as another not so difficult drive on our way through Transylvania and the Carpathian Mountains to get to Bran Castle to see Dracula. A1 is going very well until we got to the part where they closed it down. Fortunately, we kind of knew this from the map as it appears they are still constructing the road. The darn GPS didn’t know this of course, so we got a lot of “in 200 meters make a U Turn, in 150 meters, make a U Turn”. Stupid thing. We muted it and waited for it to catch up to where we were about 100 kilometers down the road.

The drive through the mountains was very pretty and interesting. People there still live a simple, rural, life style.

Sibiu is another very nice small city in Romania. We are staying the in Continental Forum hotel, which is kind of a nice place, but has the most ridiculous bathrooms in the world. All of the walls are glass. Yep, glass. Want to see your spouse take a poop? Just look around the corner at the appropriate time ( or in my case get banished to the other side of the room). The sink is very pretty and absolutely impossible to use. It is one of the bowl sinks with no counter space. It is even stuck in the corner with no shelves or anything. Who ever designed this room should be shot.

The town itself is very nice and is built around the typical squares in their Old Town with various shops, restaurants, and bars. The city was originally settled by the Romans about 200 AD. It is situated on the Cibin River.

We got kind of lucky and arrived on the final day of their annual International Festival. It featured musicians, singers, and dancers from various cultures around the world. It went on all day. It was kind of slow around lunchtime, but by early evening there was quite a crowd there.

After wandering through the square, we set our sights on finding the Liars Bridge. It is supposed to be off the Small Square on the way to the lower city. Sibiu has an Upper City, for the rich and snobby, and the lower city for the working class. Our hotel was in the Upper City, of course.

The legend is that if you are standing on the bridge and tell a lie and you are discovered later on to have told this lie, they can drag you back and throw you off the bridge. The second part of the legend is even more interesting. Brides would have to come here and profess their virginity the day before their marriage. If it turned out they weren’t virgins (ooopsy), they were supposed to get thrown off the bridge. If that happened, I would image there were some pissed off parents and a really upset new husband.

The next day is a short drive out of the city to the Astra National Museum Complex. This is a very unique and fascinating spot. While it says museum, and technically it is, it is actually an outdoor preservation of various types of authentic houses, farms, windmills, watermills, workshops, and water front buildings. They have actually relocated these buildings from all over Romania and rebuilt them on sites in this park/museum. It is huge and quite impressive.

We saw some other types of artwork also. For some reason, and we could not find an explanation, they had very colorful blow up figures of various cultures throughout the complex. Maybe it had something to do with the International Cultural Festival in town. Who knows?

Here is a short video of a church and village scene. Remember, these are actual buildings that have been relocated from towns around Romania. These are not Disney World replicas.

Of course water, lakes, and fishing were an important part of village life. The park features a lake with surrounding windmills, watermills, and typical fishing house.

Of course, even with the best depictions of early Romania life, sometimes the present world intrudes.

We walked around the lake to the various other exhibits and continue to explore.

After coming out of the windmill, for some reason the guardian geese seemed upset with me, and then Andrea.

Also along the way, we saw examples of some very old farm machinery, including a steam engine tractor and an old corn shucker.

All in all it was a fun day wandering around the complex and poking our noses into the various exhibits.

Map progress – Arad, Romania to Sibiu, Romania by car.