Help with Romania
 

My husband and I (both in our 60's)would like to visit Romania beginning of August this year. Unfortunately, I am unable to find a travel agency specializing in Romanian travel in New Jersey so all the help I can get from this forum is greatly appreciated.

We are thinking of Bucharest, Brasov and Bran (Drachula Casle) and the Black Sea.

1. Is it possible to take a day trip to Brasov and Bran and should it be by train, rental car or tour?

2. Do you advise that we spend a night in Brasov instead and then drive down to the Black Sea?

3. What resort area would you recommend? Is Mamaia the preferred one? We are no snobs, but at our age would like to stay at 3 1/2-4 stars hotels in Bucharest and 4 to 5 stars at the Black Sea.

4. How easy is it to travel by rental car?

Thank you very much for your reply and input.

Erika

Hello Erika!

1. A day trip from Bucharest would take too long, almost 3 hours to reach Brasov by train, leaving you with too short time to visit the city and the castle. Bran Castle should be done from Brasov, as it is not so near. You can also do this trip by car, but if you want to do it in one day, it will have to be a little speedy, so again, base yourself in Brasov for Bran Castle.

2. Yes, spend a night in Brasov. It is a beautiful city. Visit the mediaeval Black Church, walk through the old town, see the Rope Street, the narrowest in Europe they say (20in wide). Driving to the Black Sea from Brasov would take about 4 hours. By train it would take a little longer.

3. Mamaia is the biggest resort at the Black Sea and has the most of the entertainment, leisure and spending-your-time-possibilities among all the resorts there. However, there are a few beautiful other resorts as well, down the coast, about 25-30 km away (Eforie, Olimp, Jupiter, Neptun). Mamaia used to be called the Pearl of the Coast. Maybe it still is.

4. Driving can be difficult at times, with crowded roads during summer. You can search for Clifton's report about visiting Romania ("Curses, blessings and cabbage") for more details about this.

Good luck!
Gabriel

Erika,

I've been to Romania just the once, and with very little overlap to where you're planning. But if it's of any use to you, the long report Gabriel mentioned is here:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34543931

Couple of things I can say - Bran is pretty low on the list of places we'd return to. It's a well preserved castle, but not big and not at all what it's sometimes touted to be. There really is no Dracula history to it, and as I said, it's a nice castle, it was also the busiest place we saw and that was in off-season. The parking areas of the castle are surrounded by vendors of rubber masks and plastic skeletons, but also some handcrafts.

It's all taste though, and ours may not be similar (lodging, for instance). What I will say is that our favorite places were:

Sighisoara: "Pearl of Transylvania". Tourists here, but not like Bran. It's a gothic walled Saxon town citadel with a giant clock tower. #1 recommendation I can make to see the Romania of stories. We stayed in a nice little guesthouse, but not 4*

Sibiu: Bigger walled city, beautiful faded center. Few tourists. Grand but a little faded, the Impartul Romanilor (The Roman Emperor) Hotel was the best we stayed in. Big rooms, king bed turned on a diagonal. This was our view out the window in the morn.
http://www.trekearth.com/gallery/Eur...hoto172156.htm

Rasnov: Just down the road from Bran, actually closer than Bran is to Brasov. Bran is a castle. Rasnov is an entire deserted walled town on a hill that spirals and spirals until you reach the top. 20 times more impressive than Bran. A view from the top:
http://www.trekearth.com/gallery/Eur...hoto180246.htm

There are tons of other places (Hunedoara, Bukovina, Maramures) but of course, no one can see them all. I haven't been the the coast or Bucharest, so not much help there.

We drove a rental car from Budapest and back again. Whether anyone else should, I hesitate to guess. I thought Ireland was ok, but someone came back the other day quite upset that driving was not as easy as expected. So I suppose that it's relative.

I was ok with it, but it is challenging and you have to be aware constantly of obstacles in the road. We saw constant animals, people, horsecarts etc to swerve around. But we went places we could have never gone by train. Someone else here I've noticed recommends a tour guide, so that might be a way to get a customized plan and a driver? Here is a very typical view of what we saw on the roads (for the last of the illustrated guides!). It's representative except there would usually be a cow, chicken or sheep loose in the mix:

http://www.trekearth.com/gallery/Eur...hoto182203.htm

Anyway, I do hope you enjoy. Romania is a place I won't forget and I know when I get back, it won't be the same place.

Thank you for your helpful information. I guess it would be best to fly into Bucharest, stay two nights and then drive by car to Brasov. Is Brasov an easy town to drive around in? We have driven in Italy, Germany, Spain, Protugal, etc. My husband loves to drive on the mountain passes.


Clifton, great report. Gabriel thanks for your input. If you come across any more information, I would love it. This forum has helped in the past few years tremendously both in Europe and the USA.

Thanks again.

Erika, we just returned from a privately guided tour in Romania booked through General Tours. We had our own car and driver/guide and would highly recommend this as a nonstressful way to travel through Romania. If you are still tuned into this post and would like some more info, let me know.

We visited Bucharest, Brasov, Sibiu, Sinaia, Sighisoara and then added on a couple of days seeing the painted monasteries up in Bucovina.

Stayed at Hotel Riviera in Mamaia 12 years ago. We chose that hotel because it had two guards watching over the parking lot. Left the car in the lot and used feet, public transport, and taxis for getting around. Taxis were always trying to squeeze some more out of us. From my travel log: A guy at the train station told me "Because of this damn capitalism we have to hustle you tourists to earn a living." Hustle back and negotiate everything.

I don't know how many "stars" the Riviera had. It was OK. It is right on the beach. We had a Black Sea view from our 12th floor balcony.

I think you'll find more upscale places in Varna, Bulgaria, another big resort area. We liked the food better in Bulgaria but I wouldn't recommend the hotel we stayed in. There were many others costing much more.