As we only had one night in Bucharest we got up early to do a bit of sightseeing before heading to Brasov at 1pm.
Before catching the metro into the city, we went to station and bought our tickets for the train to Brasov. Another easy purchase and no issues buying tickets, they tend to speak a little English and this enables us to communicate without too many problems.
We caught the metro to the old town area and took a walk through a park, eating our banana for breakfast and then taking in the sights of the parliament building, which was absolutely huge! Sadly we could not get the picture we wanted of the parliament because right across the road, the small square where we wanted to stand was blocked off due to good old André Rieu who is performing a number of concerts in Bucharest, clearly very popular here!
From the parliament we headed down one of Bucharest's many wide open boulevards into the old town and took photos, dodging the many vans making deliveries. It was very different to the night before where all the cafes were pumping with customers, clearly Bucharest is more of a night time city than a morning one. We went for a coffee and were shocked by the prices! A cafe latte was $5.00! That's even more than you'd ever see back home. So we settled for an espresso at the cost of $3.00. But, I do have to say, it was an awesome coffee!
Following our coffee, we explored a bit more enjoying the beautiful architecture of the old town, you can see why they once called Bucharest the Paris of the East. It is very pretty here, but also has that typical ugly side where the lovely buildings have been replaced by communist style towers and concrete facades.
By now we were feeling peckish, so stopped in a small trendy little eatery for a panini filled with a caprese salad, so fresh and tasty. The service was excellent and again, very friendly.
It was time though after our lunch to head back to the hotel to catch the train, we dodged the many homeless people as we walked back to the station, the poverty here around the station is quite extreme. I saw one homeless man with a pile of stuff which included a vacuum cleaner! God knows what he needs that for!
We boarded the train a bit before 1pm and departed on time. Weaving through the Romanian countryside we saw lots of cute little houses and pretty scenery. We pulled into Brasov right on time at 3.25pm and then caught a local bus into the centre, also very easy, just need to be careful to maintain balance on the bus when you have your back pack on!
From the bus stop it was a short walk to the hotel, when we arrived at the hotel there was a sign telling us to head into the bistro for check in as reception was closed, so we did that and stood there waiting, but no one came to greet us, so we walked back upstairs, to reception, to find the door now open. A man stood in the doorway looking at us as if to say, what are you doing here? I said we have a reservation, he said "You have a room?", again in a manner as if he was shocked. I confirmed yes, we have a booking under the name of Megan, then from behind the man who continued to block the doorway, a lady calls out, yes, they have a reservation! He soon moved out of the way, welcoming us and telling us to take a seat. Clearly people who stay at this establishment don't normally carry a back pack and probably arrive by car, not train, looking slightly sweaty and bedraggled! It was hard not to have a bit of a sour taste in our mouth from this greeting! But we will move on, MerryMegsy may have a thing or two to say about the accommodation when doing a review on trip advisor!
So after freshening up and making ourselves look super nice, we walked back past reception and off for a walk around the old town before stopping for drinks and dinner. We found a restaurant than served some traditional food tonight and totally enjoyed it! I had cabbage with sausage and Pete had cabbage rolls, yummy!
After dinner we stopped for an ice cream before heading back to the hotel for bed.
Tomorrow we will spend the day looking around Brasov and the next 2 days after that will be time to explore the castles of the area which include the infamous Bran castle, known for being the castle of Dracula fame!
I can't wait to see them, I expect it to be very touristy, so stay tuned to the blog for more exciting updates :-)
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