Hunedoara

Considered one of the seven wonders of Romania (who knew that was a thing), Corvin Castle is one of the largest castles in Europe. It was my first stop after a 2.5hr drive from Timisoara, now into Transylvania. I’ll take their word for it size status, but it was very knights and battle-esque complete with a wooden bridge over a big ditch (hard to get a moat to work on a hill I guess) and towers with slots for archers to shoot their arrows out. It even had a bear pit - cause how can you have a castle without that (note no bears anymore 🧸).

I followed the path around inside the castle, going up and down either winding stone or steep wood staircases. Safety isn’t a thing here it seems. It gave off a Stark’s from Game of Thrones vibe with all the stone and wood - so originally I got that vibe. But then the outside just looks too fancy for them.. Even though it was 30 degrees today it gave a cold and dark feeling, really adding to the medieval vibe. Like it’s prettier and than Winterfell, but just had that cold old castle vibe. Which Game of Thrones family would you put here?

Ok back to reality, it was built in the 15th century and then added to in the 17th and 18th centuries. Climbing up the towers gave a nice view over the town and scenery (although seems a lot of open cut coal mining happens around here). No fancy frills here - this place was built for battle!

The museum of torture looking over the castle sets the scene for life in that age, with a guillotine and stocks welcoming you to the castle ticket office. I decided not to go into that museum, given there was already a corpse (only then skeleton remained) inside the castle. Instead I grabbed a late lunch at a restaurant nearby called werk werk. Romania is very meat heavy in their dishes - chicken schnitzel and potatoes for me.

Even though I didn’t really learn much during my visit as I forgot to get the audio guide and the app was too slow, I enjoyed wandering around. Probably heard the most background English (American) that I’ve heard in the last couple of weeks which was not what I expected. If I was a day later (and staying overnight) I could have seen the ‘white night’ event they have tomorrow.En savoir plus