A Bus to Bran

A lazy start on a grey morning. Summoned a bargain Bolt to the classy bus station to hop on the bus to Castle Bran, inspiration to Bram Stoker for Dracula.

Some banter with a couple of young German legal eagles passed the journey nicely.

The castle loomed majestically over the town below. The path below was full of souvenir tents, and there were far too many people - bus trips and lots of school children….but that didn’t detract from the Castle being a good day out.

The torture rooms were well worth the extra money, and two young children were shrieking with delight at all the gruesome ways a human could be defiled in the name of extracting confessions! Their mum was squealing in horror as they chose their favourite punishment….

The final part was dropping down a long lift, fitted inside the original well, on to the moderately daft ‘time tunnel’. At least it saved a long walk downhill!

With temperatures remaining cool, we tried out Queen Marie’s Tea Room for soup, a drink, and a warm up.

A grand day out!

Return bus was due at 4pm, but we already knew that timetables in Romania were more of an aspiration than a fact….we passed the time chatting with an Aussie lady from Melbourne, travelling with her son.
And of course indulged in a naughty but nice ‘chimney cake’ - a Transylvanian speciality 😍

Back home, we had seen there was a small mural to visit near the station, but first dined well at FRACT - the ‘friendly restaurant and cozy terrace’. Felt like quite a swanky place, although since we were early, we had the sole attention of the proprietor and the maître d' 💪

A stroll home admiring the fine old architecture (!) to close off our time in BrašovRead more