Day 3: Waving at Dracula (And Elk, and Roma, and Shepherds)

We got another slightly late start today, since the hotel blocked in our car with a line of other cars for which they didn't have keys. So after some yelling and a quick breakfast, and after the hotel tracked down all the owners of the other cars and made them come downstairs at 7:30 am to move them, we were on the road to Peles Castle in Sinaia. Along the way we saw a huge elk just hanging out in someone's front yard and also a fox (dead, but it still counts!). It's also very cold here in the morning, so the fields are covered in frost.

Peles was the summer residence of the Romanian royal family and was built for King Carol I from 1866 to 1914; it was the first castle in Europe to have electricity and is also notable for having the family's original belongings (including a staggering amount of art, German stained glass, and huge Murano glass chandeliers).

 I didn't take many pictures inside with my phone, since you had to pay per device, but we toured both the top and bottom floors and saw the suite for Austria's Franz Joseph I and his wife Empress Elizabeth; the suite had walls of tooled Cordoba leather and was pretty lavish considering they only visited one time. There was also a concert hall where the famous Romanian composer George Enescu played and a theater with Klimts on the wall, since King Carol I's wife was a patron of all forms of art.

The castle is also full of secret doors and passageways, for royal sneaking.

And all around the castle were Roma women, selling baskets of fresh raspberries. Fun fact: since traffic is so slow in Romania, they also walk up and down the roads selling them, since chances are you'll be at a full stop and able to make a purchase at any given time.

After Peles we headed for Bran Castle, the most popular tourist destination in Romania as well as Bram Stoker's inspiration for Dracula. However, Stoker never actually came to Romania (he just saw the castle in a picture) and the real Dracula, Vlad Tepes, was probably never in the castle. I love anything macabre, so I still wanted to see it despite it not actually being Dracula's castle. Unfortunately, so did every other tourist in Romania, and after being about two miles outside of the town with no parking, we gave up. Below is a quick pic of Bran Castle as we drove by. 

And then just a Romanian man, driving his horse to a carnival in a field while his friends drank in the back of the buggy...as one does. 

We also drove through Rasnov, the outskirts of which were very poor--there are stray dogs everywhere, and we also saw a colt just walking down the street with some goats. In the fields nearby were shepherds wearing tall knit hats and using their crooks and sheep dogs to herd sheep; there were also buggies passing by on back roads. And of course driving calmly on the actual road, as drivers careened crazily by them.

 

 

 

Since we got back to Brasov earlier than expected, we decided to explore the old town...below is an administrative building, the main square, and the tower of the Black Church (so named because of a fire that blackened its walls).

Then we ate at Le Ceaun (the cauldron), and I had a mushroom pie with garlic yogurt sauce and also a pitcher of elderflower lemonade.

And then I found the most beautiful little pastries in the world (the top is marzipan, covering a thick and gooey brownie).

 

Tomorrow we're heading to a lake in the forest and to see a fortified cathedral...maybe. You never know here if you're going to get to do what you planned or not!