I'll be in Romania for two weeks this summer, taking advantage of a ridiculously cheap flight from Easyjet, and I'll be driving around with nothing booked in advance.

As usual the Easyjet website took the opportunity to try and sell me care hire (through Europecar) and, as usual, I found websites offering cars for a great deal less, such as http://www.cars4rent.ro although the daily charge for comprehensive insurance was excessive: about €21 + €8 for insurance on something like a Dacia, which would do fine--something with four doors and room for two child seats.

Does anyone have any experience with these people? Can anyone recommend any other car hire company? There seems to be some dispute at the moment which makes it unclear which Bucharest airport I'll be flying into, but the idea will be to rent a car from whichever one it is, and return it to the same place two weeks later.

With thanks.

Peter N-H

Anybody?

Anybody else looking to drive in Romania this year?

With thanks,

Peter N-H

I will be in Romania (and Bulgaria) for 3 weeks in April.
I am also interested in any information on Car Rental.....

We agreed not to drive in Romania, yet many have done so successfully. I guess we grew up in a Romania where speeding was a mere 80km/hr and all Dacias competed to pass the others. Quite a different matter today with people racing in powerful newer cars, so I do advise to at least get a more powerful and sturdy car, especially with 2 kids in tow. I would not hop in a Dacia ever again, except maybe in remote regions, far away from speedy traffic.

But isn't the Dacia of today rather a different beast from the ones you grew up with? Isn't it now in fact a Renault in thin disguise--a thoroughly Western car?

I've heard the driving in Romania is insane and largely unqualified, but I'll be taking it gently and assuming everyone is out to kill me. I'm sure I've driven in worse places (I spend a lot of time in Asia, and have driven everywhere from Fiji to Lithuania) and I do plan to stay mostly in remote areas.

Any recommendations on car rental would still be welcome.

Peter N-H

Peter:


I have driven most of Central and Eastern Europe during the past 30 years. Romania, more than anywhere else, primarily for historical research purposes. During the "regime" it was very difficult...road blocks, potholed "major" highways, petrol and lodging shortages, poor signage, etc. Many anxious moments.

I rented my cars in Munich or Berlin usually...and a few times in Hungary. For a while there was a restriction for rental cars being driven into the east...but it's since been waived.

After the revolution, things improved slowly, but as recently as October 2005 I escorted 16 of my readership on a broad journey through Romania and Bulgaria, and was amazed at the positive changes, even in the rural regions. We had a Mercedes mini bus...
Driving will not be a problem. Rather than a Dacia, Toyotas are available..ask for one. I have no doubt that you will find Romania to be scenic, welcoming and most interesting....and now much more tourist-friendly. All in all, a very satisfying place to visit.

Anything further that I can help you with,Peter, please do not hesitate to ask me directly if you wish. I can send you recent pix of almost any area you will be visiting...hotel, resto recommendations, site suggestions etc.

Stu T. (Los Angeles)
rozstu1@aol,com

That's "aol.com"

Dacia has always been a Renault under the skin. The new ones should be fine. We weren't in Bucharest and so cannot speak of the traffic there, but once out of the smaller cities, traffic was relatively light, but that was a couple of years ago. Here's my report:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34659808

My thanks for various responses.

I'm not really after information on Romania or its sights--there's plenty of that in guide books or on-line, and anyway I don't plan to make any plans (except to make a roughly clockwise circle) or book anything in advance, except, as I originally said, a car. I wouldn't even do that but I will have two small children with me so for once I want to keep fuss down to a minimum.

But if booking a car I want to do it for a fair rate from a company that will reliably deliver an equally reliable vehicle.

So again, can anyone recommend a car hire company providing service from Bucharest's airports?

Thanks,

Peter N-H

AutoEurope offers airport pickups, but its prices are steep, in my opinion.

Europcar, too. But if I remember correctly it was around £500 for two weeks as opposed to £300 for two weeks with the local company I mentioned in my original post. All too often the budget options are companies that don't exist except as a means of consolidating myriad small companies into a larger booking system, it seems. The two times I've booked via these kinds of systems I've been told I could have paid less by dealing directly. In the case of a car rented in Spain, it had multiple small dents and other damage, and it's well known from consumer research out of the UK that many rental vehicles found in this way would not pass UK safety tests even if they are deemed adequate locally.

It's trying to find a balance between price and reliability that's the problem. If anyone has direct experience of renting in Romania it would be good to hear about it. I'm not going until July, so there's no rush. Perhaps someone will pop up before then.

Peter N-H

In January 2007, I used Thrifty from Baneasa. There were no problems; everything went well.

Last week I used Ecoline from Brasov. When I returned the car, there was a little complication.

The registration and insurance papers for the car were on the sun visor, which I had used several times during my driving.

As I was getting my backpack out of the back, the rental agent went to the driver's side and asked: "Where are the car's papers?"

I had to pay 50 euros more in cash because the papers were missing.

At this point, I honestly do now know if the papers blew out of the window as I was driving (you think that I would notice that) or if the agent, after opening the car door, quickly pocketed the papers.

Just be careful if you rent a car -- if the papers are on the sun visor, move them to the glove compartment.

Peter,

If you read the beginning of my report, you would know that I found lower rates in Hungary. So if easyJet offers similarly low fare flights to Hungary, it might be worthwhile to start there, unless you absolutely want to see Bucharest. It's a day's drive from the airport to the Romanian border, should you feel compelled to skip Hungary altogether.

Michael: Thanks, but as I mentioned from the beginning, I've booked a flight to Romania and so I'm looking for information on renting in Romania.

I don't have any particular desire to visit Bucharest, but it is where flights go. In fact I'm not planning to go into Bucharest itself, but to head away from the city.

Centralmainer: Many thanks for those details. I can't get the Thrify website to give me any quotes at the moment, but usually local companies will come in much cheaper than the global names. It's just a question of being confident about the safety of the vehicle, and obviously you were satisfied with that. Ecoline's pricing seems to be the same as that of other local companies whose sites I've visited.

And thank you for the note on possible shenanigans. Spending a great deal of time in less-developed parts of Asia where many tricks are played on hapless travellers, I fear I sometimes come across as overly suspicious when travelling elsewhere. But perhaps that will come in handy on this trip.

Peter N-H

Ha! Thinking to add a family to my trip to Romania I found the Easyjet website no longer had the flight I'd booked listed. I wrote to enquire and after a few days received a reply that said there weren't any flights on the dates I'd booked without making any reference to the fact I had already made a booking and paid for it.

I've written back to ask when they had been planning to tell me my flight didn't exist, and when they were planning to make a refund, and what compensation there might be given that I'd made other arrangements.

Perhaps I'll fly to Budapest after all, although since the argument that car rental was cheaper there is based on the idea that it's US$100 per day in Romania, whereas there are at least two companies with about €28 per day (US$42-ish?), I'm not sure the argument holds (much as I like Budapest).

But Plan B is currently under consideration, or would be if I weren't too busy, and too annoyed because all flights to all relevantly similar places are double the price my advance planning had originally obtained.

Peter N-H

Peter, if you do choose to start in Budapest -- we found that a number of rental agencies were fairly restrictive in allowing cars to cross the border to Romania. Certainly all of them expected them to be brought back and not dropped (other than Hertz, which had astromical price differences to begin with). Many added costs to add the crossing to the car's rental agreement, which in our case WAS inspected at the frontier, even though the car was being returned where it was picked up.

The exception was Budget, based at a hotel in Buda. They were the only major agency that seemed not to have an issue with the crossing, as long as it were arranged in advance. There were a couple of other local Budapest agencies that said they could work with us, but Budget was as cheap and we were familiar with thier policies. Of course, this was a couple of years ago, so more agencies may have dropped some of their restrictions.

By the way, have you discovered the budget airline listing sight www.whichbudget.com ?

Hopefully I am not making an assumption based on poor memory, but when I used to read your advice on China travel, I seem to recall you being based in the UK?

If so, it appears you may be able get to one or the other of the Bucharest airports from one of the many London area airports on Blue Air or Wizz Air (not that I find the latter's name confidence-inspiring). Or to Cluj from Luton, also on Wizz Air. For what it's worth.

However, if you fail to wander into some of the villages in between Sighisoara and Agnita that are *not* in those guides, I take it all back.
(j/k)

I'm not eager to do any border crossing anyway, I must admit. A couple of weeks bumbling around Romania will do fine.

I curse Easyjet, however. The usual policy with this family is to cast around for interesting prices months and months in advance and then see if those prices take us somewhere we'd like to go. I'd originally got a family of four (including infant) to Romania and back for £187, booking in early January.

I've looked at about eight airlines to Romania or near it, and there's no chance of paying less than double that figure now, and usually more. Now I've got the guide books, maps, etc. I don't want to start all over again. But I bet we end up in Poland instead, which will still be more expensive than the original price.

I curse Easyjet.

Peter N-H

Understandable and no doubt frustrating.

For what it's worth, the border crossing in each direction was remarkably easy and quick. Stop at first booth; hand passports, car papers (supplied by Budget in handable form) out the window; and wait for 1 min for bored nod. Pull forward to customs for the I-need-a-nap blink as he refuses any passports and papers and waves hand. About 5 minutes total for us. If you see a long line of trucks waiting, pass them. That's not your line.

If you see a bunch of guys pouring through cars of nervous looking tourists at the first gas station or wide spot in the road, once you cross the border... drive past them when they dart in the road to flag you down. Better yet if you could graze one of them just a bit... It's some sort of "fumigation" scam they're pulling, doing "mandatory" disinfections. Heard about it from others, I veered around and just kept going.

Anyway, the crossing seemed fairly painless for us (one US citizen, one Australian but traveling on her Irish passport). But if it's Poland, then I hope you post a bit about it. You alwayts seemed adept at finding things others do not.

I didn't mean to suggest I was border-phobic: I drove Estonia to Latvia to Lithuania and back before any of these countries joined the EU, for instance, and I could tell you stories about crossing between Kazakhstan and China, and China and Kyrgyzstan that would make your hair stand on end.

What I meant to imply was that there seems more than enough to keep anyone occupied for two weeks in Romania itself, and I'm not keen to rush. Some of the car hire companies in Romania won't stomach border crossings either. I've been to Hungary three times, so just flying into Romania and staying there seems fine.

As for finding out things that others don't know about, in China that's my job. In eastern Europe I'm just happy to be a tourist like anyone else; see some of the big sights and otherwise take back roads (although with caution in Romania). This is supposed to be a holiday, mostly.

I await a response from Easyjet before no doubt getting even more annoyed and bad-temperedly casting about for other alternatives. Except that I have to go to Australia next week so this will all be on hold.

In the meantime, the man who cuts my hair and a woman on the staff of my building's janitor service are both from Romania, and their delight at finding someone who's heard of the place has only been exceeded by now finding that I'm actually going there.

I feel slightly obliged to go now.

Peter N-H