Back in Romania

It's been what, eight long months since I last posted anything and I know that’s been waaay to long; but I just haven’t been traveling anywhere nor doing anything worthy of posting.  And I apologize for that.

I suppose I should have written about Elise’ wild adventure from LA to LA (that would be Lower Alabama to Los Angeles) to attend the NCAA Football Championship during what was, admittedly, the worst snow storm across America in forever. 


Or maybe I should have written about some of my recent adventures in Pulaski TN, but let’s face it; Pulaski isn’t really as
interesting as China and India and Romania.  It’s a small town so it only qualifies for small publicity, so tune in to twitter for those updates.

 

At any rate, I now find myself back in Romania again. 
Actually, I have been here for two weeks but unless you want me to write about work stuff (no, I didn’t think you did), or the rain (it hasn’t stopped much), there hasn’t been too much to chronicle.  It has literally rained every day since I arrived.  Slight drizzle to fully qualified thunderstorms.  I haven’t seen the Sun for two weeks.  Temps have generally been in the 40’s (F), but the rain just prevents any outdoor activity. 
And in case you are wondering, yes, Romania shares a border with Ukraine, but there are no issues here and those locals I have asked are pretty bored with the subject and have a somewhat defeatist attitude on the whole affair as it is ("Russia will do what they wanna do anyway and we need the oil and gas minerals, and blah, blah, blah)".  But no worries, I have been safe.

But yesterday (Saturday) we managed to get out of town and do some fun activities.  Despite the fact it was supposed to rain again, we made our schedule.  Our local Admin Assistant, Simona (who I called "The Little Match Girl" all day becasue of her scarf, planned to host me and the other American, Brian, for a day in the mountains.  The plan was to drive north to Siniaia (Sinai) to see the Peles Castle then continue to Busteni to visit the Cantacuzino Castle, and then finally on to Brasov to see the Bran Castle, tour the city, have dinner, and then return to Ploiseti.

Of course when I woke up Saturday morning, it was raining hard and I wasn’t really excited to go, but we had committed to doing this and so we just dressed appropriately for the weather, put on our best smiles and jumped in the car with Simona and headed out.

Fortunately, the further north we went travelled the less rain we encountered so our spirits began to climb.  We finally found some patchy snow just south of Sinaia and as we arrived, it was around 32F with some slight sunshine.

Sinaia is the home of Peles (pronounced Pelesh) Castle, home of Ferdinand I, king of Romania (1914–1927).  Ol’ Ferdinand was one of the good guys, so everybody liked him and he apparently tried very hard to pull Romania together. 
The palace was built in the 1870’s and is a beautiful palace as you might expect, but even more so once inside.  There is a fee for taking pictures, which we didn’t pay, so I had to sneak my photos until one of the workers began to really get upset with me.  So I finally played along.  But the hand carved woodwork and paintings and Frescoes were absolutely stunning.  The castle has 160 rooms (of which we only saw around 10-15) and our guide spoke English, so it was really quite interesting to see.

About 20 minutes north of Sinaia is Busteni which boasts Castle Cantacuzino which was the home of the Prime Minister during Ferdinand’s reign.  Obviously much smaller but the Prime Minister knew something about real estate as his view from his front yard of the local mountains is incredible!  The interesting tidbit about this house is that it’s completely empty.  Beautiful woodwork and some incredible Frescoes on the wall of the past monarch family tree - but not one single rug, chair, sofa, book, china, crystal – nothing.  When I asked about this I was told by the guide that the Germans stole everything during WWII and the items have never been located since.  What a shame.  But check out these views outside!  I was more impressed with the outside views of the snow covered mountains, I do admit!

After a nice lunch on the grounds, we walked through a small snow flurry and as the temperature dropped, we drove further north to Brasov (pronounced Brashov) and visited Bran Castle.

I have been to Bran Castle in the past as you may recall, but Brian had not, however I enjoyed the repeat visit.  Bran is the stereotypical medieval castle with winding halls and stairs and fortified buttresses.  After the Crusaders left, Vlad the Impaler used the castle for his home and then Bram Stoker used it for his Dracula story so many tales and ghosts float all around as you walk through.  Brian and I had to run through the obligatory “Young Frankenstein” movie lines.


We picked up a snack of fresh, hot off the grill Kurtos Kolach (Kur-tosh Ko-lac) which is a bread/donut type of pastry wrapped in thin strips around a cylinder, rolled in sugar, cinnamon, and butter then quick fired over coals to cook and believe me when I say it’s a sugar rush, but wonderfully delicious. 
We ate this as drove into downtown Brasov (pronounced Brashov) and walked through the old city and saw the Black Church (so named because it had burned 400 years ago and the inside is charred black).  It was closed so did not see inside.  We also saw the Black Tower (it had also burned) which should not be confused with the White Tower (Brian and I went through a few “Lord of the Rings” references), and finally ended up at the old City Walls from the 1500’s which are still standing.  I just love that all of this history is just interspersed with homes, soccer fields, and everything modern.  It is so very impressive
that these structures still exist and no graffiti, no defamation, and no commercialization.   For those family members reading; I also appreciated that the mountain next to Brasov is the Tampa Mountain.  No relationship.

 

We had dinner in the old city at “La Bucatarul Vesel” (the Happy Cook) which had enough garlic to, well, ward off any vampire within 100 miles for the next 2 years.  It was good.  But it was definitely strong!

We drove back to Ploiesti through some fo the worst fog I have ever seen and after Simona missed three exits for Ploiesti, we finally could see an exit and got back home (which was a good thing – the next stop would have been Bucharesti, and we were too tired for that added 50 miles round trip).

I fly home this coming Thursday, so I probably won't have much more adventuring - but the weather should be better this week, so you just never know.  I do suspect I'll be back here later in the spring - so just stay tuned!
More pictures ...

Peles Castle up Close



Inside Peles Castle (before I got yelled at)

Another View from Castle Cantacuzino

Bran Castle

The Black Church in Brasov



More City walls around Brasov 

More City Walls with Brasov in the background