Blogs from Transilvania, Romania, Europe - page 17

This morning we picked up our auto at Fox Auto Rental. It is a surprisingly roomy 4 door Citroen Picasso. We had to drive through the city to get to the M3. Once again I saw many more incredible buildings and cityscape. M3 is the motorway that takes us from Budapest northeast to Romania. An electronic vignette to use this toll road is required - it cost me about $7 for unlimited use of Hungary's 5 toll roads. M3 allows speeds of up to 130 kph, however many Benz, Audis and BMW passed me at 20 or more above that. The roads are very smooth, have rest areas and gas stations with food every 20 km. That same $7 dollars will get you from Burlington to Toronto on the 407ETR once. We took a detour toward ... read more

Got up at 7am, hit snooze which cut into my yoga time; did a bit of stretching and we were ready when Florin got here at 8am. Only Carrie and I for this trip ... we are the only ones who feel up to 1480 steps up (and back down) at Poenari. As Florin promised, the scenery was breathtaking, Bran valley ... mountains surrounding lush green fields with farm houses. Sometimes a single lonely house up in the mountains. Then through gorgeous little towns with pretty houses, chicken next to tombstone, cow next to a porch overflowing with flowers, women with scarves on their heads working in the yards. A woman walking a cow down the street on a leash. Families harvesting grass and assembling the haystacks. Families working fields of vegetables. Donkeys herding sheep. ... read more

I was up at 7, feeling quite good -- considering how many empty wine bottles are in the kitchen. Short yoga routine, then breakfast, then shower, then got organized for our first day trip. We met Florin outside at 8:30; we had a surprise guest along for our tour. She was a very quiet young woman from Japan. Sadly, none of us can remember her name. The car is a smallish car but with a third row of seats. The Japanese girl was in the front passenger seat, three of us in the regular back seat, and one in the “back back”. Quite cozy. Today's tour is the “three castle tour”. We drove through a few small Saxon villages, and Florin explained how to differentiate the Saxon buildings and the Romanian buildings. Saxon buildings have a ... read more

Rooming with Leslie means early rising. :-) She woke up at 6:30 and opened the drapes. I got up at 7, and did some yoga while she went for a walk. It's a very pretty day, warm with blue sunny skies, so I started on the balcony, but the concrete was a bit hard -- I moved inside for floor poses. Leslie came back and at 8:15 we headed out together. We walked to Old City, which was completely deserted except for some unhealthy looking street dogs cleaning up after last night's revelers. It was fun to see the same place again, in the light. We explored a few more blocks than last night, and found an old Greek Orthodox church at the dead-end of a torn-up street. Today is Sunday so there was a service. ... read more

We headed south. Then east. Then West. Camping is free in Romania. This means if you want to find an actual campsite you have to know where one is. A six year old Lonely Planet is probably not the best source of information, and this is what we had. We drove through Sibiu – couldn’t find the campsite. Couldn't find the campsite in Curtea de Arges either, and the campsite another 50ks down the road looked truly ordinary. A brief stop at a random servo for diesel and beer. We bought some dark beer which is dangerous – a lot of it had turned out to be sickly sweet malt based stuff. In the lolly section at the same servo though - truly excellent liquid rum centred chocolates. These would have to wait until the evening ... read more