This is part of a series called Pan European Sojourn 2023
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- The start of our Pan European Sojourn
- And we’re off — first stop Palma de Mallorca!
- Alicante, Spain
- Sète and Aigues Mortes, France
- St. Tropez and Gassin, France
- Portofino and Camogli, Italy
- Paris and Angers, France
- Bucharest, Romania
- Into the Carpathian Mountains — Peles Castle
- Brasov and Sighisoara, Romania
- Bran Castle and the legend of Dracula!
- Vidin, Bulgaria
- Valiko Tarnavo and Arbanasi, Bulgaria
- Rolling down the (Danube) river and Golubac Fortress, Serbia
- Belgrade, Serbia
- Novi Sad, Serbia and Vukovar, Croatia
- Pécs, Hungary
- Budapest, Vienna, and end of trip
This morning we took a walk around Brasov. To me, this city showcased the best in preservation of it’s medieval past and innovation for the future (they have already migrated their bus system to total electricity). It is a very clean city with much less graffiti than we saw in Bucharest. Our guide, Alex, was born and grew up there, so we got lots of personal anecdotes about the area. It turns out that where the concert was the previous evening was actually “Council Square,” the center of the old city surrounded by 13th to 15th century buildings that included the town hall with a chiming clock tower (I think it is the only one left in Europe), the Black Church (so named because of the smoke damage from the Great Fire of 1689 that destroyed much of the city), the Jewish Quarter, and remaining sections of the fortress wall and towers. It really was a beautiful (and very walkable) city.
Council Square. You can see where they were tearing down the stage from the previous night’s concert
There are at least five different architectural styles represented in Brasov’s old city. Very eclectic!
The Black Church. I’m not too sure why they haven’t cleaned it. I guess it’s probably because they couldn’t call it the “Black” Church anymore…
The original entrance into the medieval city of Brasov.
A secret walkway that our guide, Alex, showed us. He said he used to take his girlfriends down here to make out!
From there we went to Sighisoara (say that 5 times fast!), one of the most beautiful and best-preserved medieval towns in Europe. In fact, it has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Being high up on a promontory, the views were pretty spectacular, but walking through the narrow cobble stone streets with the old burgher houses was what really made this a fun stop. I should also mention that this was where Vlad Draculea (otherwise known as Vlad the Impaler or, fictionally, Dracula) was born. I’ll talk more about Vlad in a subsequent post, but needless to say, the Bram Stoker novel has certainly increased tourism! This seems to be bittersweet to the locals who are rightfully proud of their heritage without all the vampire stuff. Anyway, more of that later!
After climbing a big hill, the entrance to Sighisoara.
Lot of narrow, cobblestone streets. Vlad’s birthplace is the ochre-colored house next to the tower.
One of the nine towers around the citadel
Vlad, the man, the legend.
Nice views from the citadel to the town below.
I am a traveler and sometimes clay sculptor, following a long career working in consulting. My work allowed me to travel the world extensively and I was hooked. Today, I travel with my wife/best friend to explore new places, meet new people, and learn new things.
