No trip to Romania would be complete without a visit to the mysterious lands of Transylvania. Since Bram Stoker famously used the location as a setting for the home of Draculas notorious castle it has become a region shrouded in legends and superstitions. However, we did not fear, as armed with bucket loads of garlic and a wooden stake we set off to see what we would find.
With very limited time we decided to take a day tour from Bucharest which would take us to visit two of Transylvania’s castles. The group was small, consisting of two Italians, two Indians, a Dutchman and us. The question was.. would we all be coming back?
We drove for several hours whilst our lively tour guide Serban Riga (Travel Maker Tours) kept us entertained with his extensive knowledge of Romania. The first stop on the Two Castles in One Day tour was to be Peles Castle.
Peles Castle
Far from haunting, this fairy tale castle was once the summer home of Romania’s royal family before being confiscated after the communist takeover.
The Bavarian style castle is nestled within the Carpathians Mountains surrounded by pine trees and snow-capped peaks.
Not only is the outside picturesque, the inside is equally stunning. The walls and ceilings of the grand entranceway are covered with ornately carved wood. There is also an impressive weapons room, an Arabic styled room and a library, complete with its very own secret staircases.
After leaving this beautiful building behind we made our way to the heartland of Dracula. Driving through the Transylvanian valley we caught our first sight of Romanian gypsies. Our guide drew our attention to the cars parked outside their homes.
“The houses look really poor, yet there are always really expensive BMWs and Audis outside”. Serban was not wrong, as we passed a £80,000 Audi and various BMWs. If your car has ever went missing and never found again this would be a good place to start looking.
Brans Castle
We took time to have some lunch overlooking Brans castle wondering if Dracula would be waiting. The extremely strong garlic sauce that accompanied my pork knuckle dinner would be enough to scare any vampire back into hiding.
Brans castle, the so called Draculas castle, sits prominently on a hill. This Medieval fortress was designed to be imposing as it was used to control the passage into the Transylvanian valley.
We entered the castle via steep stone stairs but we had already made a glaring mistake in the hunt for Dracula, coming during the day. As most people know, Dracula only shows himself after sunset.
The castle was once left for ruin, but was bought and renovated by the Romanian royal family, many of the walls are white washed and are now children’s nursery’s, bedrooms, and games rooms. The courtyard still retains some of the original history of the castle.
If the legends are true, and he does still wander these halls at night, there is every chance he may soon be evicted, as the current owners have it up for sale for an eye watering 60 million euro.
For us, we never did find Dracula, or any trace that such a man existed. So we ditched the garlic and wooden stakes and headed back to our tour bus.
The last stop on the tour was the city of Brasov. You can’t forget the name, the Hollywood style sign sits high above the surrounding hills as a permanent reminder.
The once fortified town is full of timeworn buildings and is famed for its “black church”.
Although it is a charming place to spend a few hours we were unable to stay for long. We had successfully crammed in as much of Transylvania’s sights as we possibly could before we had to make the three hour drive back to Bucharest.
