So here is a little recap while I try to figure out my angst. The week of July 4th, Pete and I took an overnight flight out of Toronto to Europe. We scored these business class seats that weren't very expensive for some reason. It was mad luxurious. Flight attendants kept giving us drinks and warm towels and tiny soft pretzels (it was a German airline). The seats fully reclined and were so comfortable that I could actually sleep. In my opinion, this is how all air travel should be for everyone. We only had economy plus seats on the flight home and that was far less fancy. I feel like such an ass typing that. Being all like with all my free time and disposable income, I did not enjoy the upgraded seats as much as the seriously upgraded seats as I flew through the air to faraway lands at 500 mph like a fucking magical wizard or some shit. So yeah, I have struggled to write this in a way that doesn't make me sound like Scrooge McDuck. Apologies in advance.
We did the 8 day Transylvania Revealed small group tour through Mr. Tripp with a guide named Alex. We saw so many sites in a short amount of time, which was great, but the best part of any trip is the company and we were so lucky in that regard. Joining Pete and I were Liet, who currently lives in Qatar, and Wendy from Canada. They are the kind of women who say, do and wear what they want and I liked them right away. The tour itinerary pretty much covers all the places we went, so I'm just going to highlight some of my favorite moments and sites.
But first, some historical context. Romania has 3 historical regions: Wallachia, Moldovia and Transylvania. Transylvania is in the center of Romania, surrounded by the Carpathian Mountains (which are full of bears!). Around 82BC it was the Kingdom of Dascia, which was later conquered by the Romans, then invaded by the Visigoths, Huns, and Slavs, then conquered by the Hungarians, then united into Romania in 1918. Romania was occupied by the Soviets after WWII and was under Communist rule from 1947-1989. There was a revolution in 1989, the Communist regime fell and now Romania is democratic and a member of the European Union. When you hear Transylvania, you likely think of Dracula, thanks to the story by Bram Stoker. Some say that Vlad The Impaler was the inspiration for Dracula. Vlad Tepes AKA Vlad III Dracul (so called because his father was a member of the Order of the Dragon, the purpose of which was to defeat the Ottoman Empire) AKA Vlad The Impaler was known for impaling his enemies on stake in the ground, where they were left to die slowly, painfully and publicly. Not a good way to go.
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| Before FB you could spy on your neighbors by looking out these tiny eye-shaped windows |
*Bran Castle (Dracula's castle) is a popular tourist site, and well worth seeing, even though Vlad never lived there and Bram Stoker never visited Transylvania.
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| Bran Castle |
*Palace of Parliament in Bucharest. It's the second largest (after the Pentagon), heaviest and most expensive administration building. It has 20 floors, 8 of which are underground. Construction began in the 1980s by communist dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu, who wanted to have the hugest Palace of Parliament in the world (because size matters). But it remains unfinished because he was later overthrown and executed. Today it houses the Romanian Senate and Chamber of Deputies. Plus the show Top Gear had an episode where they raced some cars through the underground tunnels.
*Salida Turda (Turda Salt Mine). This was one of my favorite places we went. It's a salt mine that was dug during the Middle Ages and is now an amusement park 120 meters underground! The temperature in the mine is 12°C and the air is salty. It's supposed to be good for your breathing. I was just excited to ride a ferris wheel and go on a boat in an underground lake.
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| Underground amusement park! |
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| Being weird on a salt covered ferris wheel underground. As you do. |
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| We're in a boat! |
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| If you're not laughing at the cropping of this selfie, we can't be friends. Just kidding, but come on. It says turd behind us. |
*Sighișoara is one of the best preserved medieval towns in Europe and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It's the birthplace of Vlad, who would later go on to rule Wallachia and do all the murdery impaling. But don't hold that against it. Sighișoara is a beautiful fairytale-esq city with colorful buildings and cobblestone streets.
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| That view though |
*Viscri, site of another fortified church (we saw a lot of those) and another UNESCO site. Also, Prince Charles has a house there. But my favorite part was this stray dog that was following us around because I fed him some crackers (From my stash of purse snacks. Highly recommend purse snacks. It's a good way to make friends abroad. If those friends are dogs. Which honestly are the best kind of friends). So many of my vacation photos are just pictures of cute dogs I saw/pet.
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| My dog friend |
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| That's Prince Charles' blue house in the background |
*Libearty Sanctuary. Another one of my favorite things we got to do, though it was also very sad. The sanctuary is home to 99 bears who have been rescued from circuses, zoos and captivity. They have health and mental problems so they wouldn't be able to survive back in the wild, but here they are no longer in cages and are free to roam the sanctuary land, which is bordered by electric fences. We heard so many sad stories here. Some of the bears had spine and leg problems from being forced to ride bikes in circuses and others were so used to being cooped up in cages that they would just walk in circles out of stress. The bears aren't fed by hand. Instead, the workers throw the food over the fences in different locations every day so the bears can learn to be semi-wild again.
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| Rescued bear |
*The cable car ride in Brasov. Alex was taking Liet and Wendy to another fortified church but I really wanted to ride the cable car up to the Brasov sign (it's like the Hollywood sign in LA) so Alex dropped Pete and I off there. Plus by this point I was a bit weary of murder castles and churches and the entirety of human history just being about killing each other. History is depressing, then you realize how little has changed and how we're still murdering and oppressing each other and it's just too heavy sometimes. I wish we'd had more time in Brasov because I really would have loved to hike the trails there. I did find a trail while running from our hotel one morning and I ran a bit there, but there are so many awesome trails in Romania I would love to go back and do a running tour there someday.
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| We got to go up behind that sign. It was pretty sweet. |
*Peles Castle. It's this ostentatious (to my taste), over the top castle built by King Carol I starting in 1873. It was the first European castle with electricity and used to be the summer house of the Romanian Royal Family. There's a lot of fancy old rich people stuff inside and a shit ton of lion statues, so if you like those things, this is the castle for you.
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| Super fancy castle |
So those are some of the highlights but the best parts of this trip were all the conversations we had with Wendy, Liet and Alex about history, travel and life. My favorite part of travel is meeting new people and hearing about their lives. Plus talking to fellow travel lovers, especially awesome solo women travelers, is the best and always makes me even more wanderlusty. And anywhere I get to go with Pete is always a good time.
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| Castle security |
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| Best travel crew |
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| Fountains in Bucharest. I stayed up late for this and it was worth it. |
Lyric of the moment: "There's a lot of vampires out there, hanging out to grab your soul. They don't live in Transylvania. They don't live in rock 'n' roll." ~Adam Ant "Vampires"
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