One of the many perks of living in Munich is that it is
practically the geographic center of all of Europe. This makes it very easy and affordable for us
to travel around. A two-hour flight can
take us just about anywhere on this continent.
So it’s nice to be able meet family or friends for quick little getaways
when they happen to be somewhere ‘nearby’ in Europe. A few weeks ago we did just this when we joined
Julie’s brother Logan for a couple of days in Romania. He was in Bucharest to recruit new employees
for this coming summer season at Grand Tetons National Park.
Julie and I were especially excited for this trip because it
was our chance to encounter the origin of Dracula and relive one of our favorite
books ,“The Historian”. This book is a great
historical/fictional account of Vlad Tepes (a.k.a. Dracula) who once ruled in
Southern Romania (Wallachia). I highly
recommend you read this book by the way, and then you will understand the
excitement that we felt.
Before we could go out on our own Dracula search we first had
to arrive at our hotel in Bucharest. We
had read that taxi scams from the airport are quite common in Bucharest and we
felt prepared to avoid becoming one of those duped tourists. But there was nothing we could really do when
the driver demanded an excessive fare and refused to give me back or let me
even take a photo of my taxi pickup ticket (which contains the relevant claims
information and explicitly says “customer must keep”). Had our bags not been in the trunk then we
probably would have had some more leverage, but instead we became another
fooled tourist. In the end, the rip off
taxi ride cost us only $40 which is still quite cheap for a long taxi ride from
the airport, but just for comparison’s sake the return taxi ride only cost us
about $10.
We quickly forgot about the rip-off when we found out our
hotel room had a huge balcony terrace.
The terrace was actually bigger than our hotel room, and appeared to be
the only room with an outdoor space. Our
luck was turning around.
After checking-in and dropping off our bags, we met up with
Logan and our personal tour guides (two Romanian locals who are employees of
Logan) who generously offered to drive us around and show us a good time for
the next 24 hours. We started out with
an Italian dinner and some drinks at a bar.
It didn’t take us long to notice that Bucharest is one of the few places
left which still allows smoking in restaurants and, furthermore, just how much
we have unadjusted from such practices.
We set out the next day for a drive with our tour guides to
the countryside towards the Carpathian Mountains and Transylvania. We first visited the stunning Peles Castle,
which was the residence of the four kings of Romania during the 20th
century. It has similar elements to our
own Neuschwanstein in Bavaria because of its location high in the mountains and
its architecture. Though what definitely
stands out as unique to this castle is its gorgeous woodwork both on the
exterior and the interior.
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| There were stray dogs everywhere - even hanging out by castles |
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| Us and our amazing tour guides |
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| A dragon head!!! Dracula?!?! |
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| The picture Julie took inside before she got in trouble for not having a photographer pass (she didn't know... oops) |
After a quick stop for lunch, we set out for Bran
Castle in Transylvania. This castle is fictitiously
marketed as “Dracula’s Castle” even though there is very little connecting Vlad
Tepes (or Bram Stoker’s writing) to the site.
But we went along with the folklore and pretended we were also searching
for clues about Dracula. It is an old 15th
century (or perhaps earlier) defense structure against the Ottoman Empire with
a maze of thick stone corridors and rooms.
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| Perfect place for a Dracula sighting |
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| View of the village from the castle |
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| Beautiful old architecture |
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| We found Dracula AND a creepy vampire-like ginger! |
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| More of the beautiful architecture |
The following day our wonderfully generous tour guides left
for their home back in Transylvania, so the three of us were on our own to
explore the city of Bucharest.
Our main
sightseeing for the day was Curtea Veche - the old ruins and 15
th
century residence of Vlad Tepes in the heart of the old city.
The site is also connected with an Orthodox church,
which is something we hadn’t really seen before.
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| Bust of Vlad Tepes on the left, the Orthodox church on the right |
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| Another stray dog 'guarding' the ruins on the left, inside Curtea Veche on the right |
Bucharest is a unique city in that it doesn’t feel touristy
at all which often made us feel like we were the only tourists there. It’s not the most beautiful city we have seen
as the poverty is high and the communist era definitely left a mark. But we enjoyed walking around and seeing some
its more raw elements (like shady electrical wiring, crazy city commuters, lack
of infrastructure, etc.). We also found
it interesting that the language sounds quite intimidating and foreign but when
written it is very similar to Spanish or Italian (with a few extra special
characters). In fact Romanian is
considered one of the romance languages.
It’s the kind of place one could probably find lots to do and it’s
probably full of little hidden gems, but we didn’t have the time or resources
(without our private tour guides) for such exploring during our quick stay.
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We mostly stuck to the small but concentrated old city,
which is populated with lots of bars and outdoor cafes. At one point we stopped by an Irish pub for
lunch where we enjoyed a good laugh. We
put in our orders: two fish and chips for the siblings and a cheesesteak
sandwich for me. Twenty minutes later we
saw the waiter bringing over the fish and chips and a slice of cheesecake. At first, I figured the cheesecake belongs to
another table, but then I realized probably why he was so surprised by my lunch
order in the first place. He had heard
me say “cheesecake” instead of cheesesteak sandwich. To be fair – I did point at the menu when ordering,
and it looked like the waiter looked to see what I was pointing at. After clarifying the issue and waiting
another twenty minutes, he finally brought me my cheesesteak sandwich. However in the meantime, I had snacked on
Julie’s large fish and chips and I no longer wanted the sandwich. In fact, I kind of wished I kept the
cheesecake after all. Lesson
learned: Don’t turn down cheesecake even
if you didn’t order one.
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| A pretty street in Old Town |
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| Logan and Julie and a true depiction of a Bavarian man |
After exhausting the old part of town, the three of us were
all pretty worn out with the 48 hours of intense tourism. We decided to just head back to our private terrace
and spend our last evening enjoying the sun and spring weather. Sometimes it is good to relax once and a
while when taking a vacation – though it has taken Julie a lot longer to figure
that one out.
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| Julie and an interesting piece of art |
