Romania: five top travel places that are worth a visit
Bucharest, Transylvania and the Black Sea coast: many sights await those traveling to Romania.
Start your journey through Romania in the capital Bucharest
If you want to visit the capital city of Bucharest, located in the south of Romania, you can usually fly to Bucharest Henri Coandă Airport. Alternatively, you can also travel by express train to the main train station Gara București Nord ("Gara de Nord"). Incidentally, express trains run from Gara de Nord to all major cities in Romania approximately every hour.
Bucharest's architecture is characterized by a mixture of different architectural styles in a small space. In Bucharest, you will find small, rural-looking houses between blocks of Bauhaus-style buildings, prefabricated buildings (which were built until the 1970s) and representative buildings of the so-called "socialist classicism" (pejoratively: "confectioner style").
After the end of the supremacy of the Turkish Sultanate (14th to 17th century), Bucharest's architects looked to Western models. Examples of the so-called Brâncoveanu architectural style, which combines Venetian and Oriental elements, include the Kretzulescu Church, the Horezu Monastery and the Mogoșoaia Castle in Bucharest.
Bucharest's cityscape is characterized not least by the approximately 100 Romanian Orthodox church buildings.
The oldest surviving building in Bucharest is the Curtea Veche church, completed in 1554 and named after a princely court residing in the neighborhood.
The Patriarchal Cathedral, consecrated in 1658, is the episcopal church of the Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church. Its floor plan corresponds to a Greek cross (a cross with four sides of equal length).
The city of Brașov in the Southern Carpathians
170 kilometers north of Bucharest you will reach the city of Brașov (Kronstadt) in the central Romanian region of Transylvania (also known as "Transylvania"). Brașov is located in the southern section of the Carpathians, a 1,300-kilometer-long high mountain range. About 70 kilometers west of Brașov rises Moldoveanu, the highest Romanian mountain at 2,544 meters.
Late medieval town houses and spacious 19th century buildings characterize the historic old town of Brașov. The city's landmark is the Black Church, built in 1477 in the Gothic style, the main church of the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in Romania.
The city of over 250,000 inhabitants can also look back on a long musical tradition. The Brașov State Opera is one of the most famous music ensembles in Romania.
Bran Castle, the "Dracula Castle"
30 kilometers southwest of Brașov is Bran Castle (Törzburg), which dates back to the 14th century. The castle complex rises impressively on the Dietrichstein rock on a pass road that leads south from Transylvania into the Romanian region of Wallachia.
Bran Castle is often presented as a Dracula castle - although the Wallachian prince Vlad III Drăculea ("The Son of the Dragon", 1431 to 1477), who served as the model for the Dracula novel character, probably never set foot in the castle.
Sibiu, the center of the settlement area of the Transylvanian Saxons
Make sure you use your stay to visit the historically significant city of Sibiu, 115 kilometers west of Brașov (Kronstadt). Sibiu was the center of the settlement area of the "Transylvanian Saxons" (German emigrants from the Rhine and Moselle regions who settled in Transylvania from the 12th century).
Sibiu probably has the highest density of sights of any city in Romania (over 100 in the city area alone).
One of the oldest buildings in the city is the 14th century chapter house, which is the seat of the church administration.
In the immediate vicinity of the chapter house is the parish church, which is still the tallest building in Sibiu with a tower height of 73 meters.
The Old Town Hall houses the city's historical museum. The (truly) Fat Tower was built as part of Sibiu's fortifications in the 16th century.
On the Black Sea: Constanța, Dobruja and the Danube Delta
Now travel to the east of Romania, to the coast of the Black Sea. Visit the sights of the city of Constanța, which lies 100 kilometers east of Bucharest and was founded as a Greek colony in the 7th century BC.
The port city with a population of 280,000 is located in the historic landscape of Dobruja. Archaeological finds prove that the region was inhabited as early as the Neolithic period. Dobruja stretches from the Black Sea region of Romania to north-eastern Bulgaria.
In the northern part of Dobruja, the Danube flows into the Black Sea. The Danube Delta, the second largest delta in Europe (after the Volga Delta), has been protected as a biosphere reserve since 1990.
