Day 22
Driving from Bucharest to Brasov
Tuesday, September 10, 2024
Bună ziua,
Today we were picking up the car we would be travelling in for the next couple of months. But first, we had to get ourselves to Henri Coandă International Airport. The easiest way to do this was to take the number 100 Airport Express bus. It cost us 3 lei each, which is about NZD$1.10 per person.
Airports are not fun places to travel to, but they usually have the largest number of car rental companies, and the largest selection of cars. Hence it can be cheaper to pick up and drop off your hire car at the airport. In the case of Bucharest, it was significantly cheaper to pick up our car from the airport.
Happily, the airport was in the direction that we wanted to travel anyway.
Hiring a Car for Eastern Europe
If you want to hire a car in Europe to travel all over the Schengen Area, it is not a problem. We have done it before and if you use one of the larger rental companies with lots of offices you don't have any problems. But as soon as you ask if you can take the car outside of the Schengen Area into Eastern Europe, you get a polite but very firm, "no".
Then we found an online company called Discover Cars. They are a bit like Booking.com, but for car hire rather than accommodation. Using their online tool we found a car hire company called Alamo, who do allow cross-border travel within Eastern Europe. Including crossing the border into Türkiye.
We booked the car through Discover Cars, and this initiated a flurry of emails back and forward about Türkiye. It got a bit confusing, because in one message thread we received a message that crossing the border to Türkiye had been approved. But a second message thread said that our request was still in progress. So we were not sure what would happen when we arrived at the Alamo desk at the airport.
When we got to the Alamo desk at the airport, they had not received any notification about our cross-border travel plans! They did have our booking, and had a car ready for us. The guys at the desk were very helpful. They listened to our travel plans and while they couldn't allow travel to Türkiye, they were able to organise the paperwork we required for cross-border travel to Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, Croatia and Hungary. The Alamo team listed all these countries in a letter, written in Romanian and English, that we must keep in the car at all times, along with insurance and registration papers.
The Alamo guys said it can be possible to arrange cross-border travel to Türkiye, but the paperwork takes two weeks, so you have to book well ahead of time. They also mentioned that crossing the border to Serbia was just not possible. "Politics", and a roll of the eyes was the reason given.
With the paperwork sorted we were able to head out to the parking lot and collect our car. To Koro's great delight, our car was a brand new VW Golf. Koro has always wanted a Golf for driving around Europe. And it is a manual transmission as well.
Our Golf has been christened "Helga", named after Private Helga Geerhart from the TV show 'Allo 'Allo. Thankfully she has a large centre screen and Apple Car Play connectivity, which will keep our marriage intact while navigating. And a manual transmission. It's been many years since Koro has driven a manual, and he is very much enjoying it.
Most importantly, there is a special little seat for Buzzy Bee. He can sit between us and keep an eye on everything.
Driving to Brasov
Driving to Brașov was easy and straight forward. The roads in Romania are generally pretty good. There's a few rough patches and potholes, but when you come from New Zealand's goat tracks you aren't really in any position to make a complaint!
Brașov is a city about the same size as Hamilton, located roughly in the centre of Romania, in the Transylvania region. It is quite a mountainous region so we were travelling uphill a lot of the time.
As always, it did not take Grandma long to find a horse. It is not unusual to see a horse and cart on the roads in Romania. Grandma got very excited every time we saw one, and was finally able to take this series of photographs as we drove past.
Bran Castle
On our way to Brașov we took a detour to the little town of Bran to visit Bran Castle - Dracula's castle!
Well, not really.
Bran Castle is believed to be the castle that Bram Stoker used as the basis for his description of the fictional Dracula's Castle. It is also believed that Bram Stoker never visited Romania. He relied on other people's written descriptions of Bran Castle.
Bran Castle was originally built as a fortress on the Transylvanian side of the border between Transylvania and Wallachia. It also acted as a customs house, collecting taxes on all goods entering and leaving Transylvania. The castle sits high on a rock that overlooks a steep sided valley. A road winds its way through the valley. So the castle would have given the soldiers and tax collectors a perfect view of all the traffic passing through the valley.
Visiting Bran Castle was easy. There were plenty of places to park in the little village of Bran, and it was very cheap parking. Then just a short walk up the hill to the castle. We had purchased our tickets online from the official Bran Castle website, so we were able to jump the queue of people waiting to buy tickets and go straight up the steep hill ... to join the queue of ticket holders waiting to enter the castle.
From the outside the castle does not look all that big. Once we were inside however, the place didn't seem to end. We kept climbing steps and going up towers, from one room to the next. It didn't seem to end!
The place was crammed with people, and it was hot and stuffy. We wouldn't want to visit in the height of the summer season, it would be bedlam.
The castle itself was a bit ho-hum. There was a secret staircase, which is always exciting, mainly because it allows your imagination to run wild with thoughts of who might have used the secret staircase and why. Funny how these secret passages always seem to have an end point in a bedroom...
The castle has been updated and modernised a lot, and is now a shameless tourist attraction playing on its links to the story of Dracula.
The highlight was the exhibition of medieval torture equipment, held in one of the towers. This costs an extra 20 lei to visit, but is well worth it. We've seen displays of this sort of gear before, but it is always fascinating to discover the many, many different methods that have been used to inflict pain and suffering on other people and to see and feel some of the equipment that was used. This display included a couple of methods we hadn't seen before, one being the Hand Saw. Gruesome.
As it is with every tourist attraction around the world, the way out is through the gift shop. In this case it was a large collection of outdoor stalls selling every manner of Romanian souvenir and trinket. A modern form of voluntary taxation that, fortunately, doesn't often work on Grandma and Koro.
Onward to Brasov
We spent about two hours at Bran Castle before we continued driving to Brașov. This was an easy drive until we got into the Old Town. The usual story, narrow streets and slippery, bumpy cobblestones. And a distinct lack of off street parking.
We discovered that parking in the old town area was actually not too bad compared to other cities. We took our time and were able to snatch a space as it became free. There didn't seem to be any reserved or residents only parking, everything we saw was first come, first served. As long as you paid the daily fee of 24 lei (about NZD$8.50).
Just as we were unpacking the car it started to gently rain. The first rain we have had since arriving in Europe. Luckily it was a short walk to our apartment.
After a quick bite to eat at a nearby restaurant we turned in for the night. It was a busy day, and we have a very special day planned for tomorrow.
Love to you all from Grandma & Koro & Buzzy Bee.