Vlad Tepes Dracula

My imagination was going wild. I couldn’t help it. Dracula was on my brain.  Although he is a fictional character created by Bram Stocker, he was loosely based off a real man named Vlad Tepes Dracula.  Living back in the 1400’s, Dracula was the prince of Wallachia, a historical region of Romania which on a modern map would encompass the entire southern half of the country.

He was also known as “Vlad the Impaler” due to his cruel way of killing his enemy.  According to the Lonely Planet (although if this trip has taught me anything, it’s taught me to not trust every word in the widely used travel guide), Dracula had the perfect technique of jabbing a wooded stake into a person and missing the vital organs which resulted in a slow and painful death that took days.

So there I was.  Standing in front of a castle that Dracula visited, but did not live. It was not at all like the wild, child-like images I had in my head. The castle was simple looking on the outside. The sky was blue with fluffy clouds and birds chirped in the lovely manicured garden and lake at the base of the castle.

The outside of Bran Castle.

When we went inside it was quite a surprise to find the rooms so welcoming.  I have a soft spot for white washed walls and wooden beams. Encouraging my imagination, it was entertaining to read their exhibit boards about vampires and Dracula.

Light fixture in Bran Castle.

Colourful details painted onto a door in Bran Castle.

The view from a window in the tallest tower of the Castle.

One of the outdoor patios of Bran Castle. It had a few patios, some facing out and some facing in toward the central courtyard.

One perspective of the castle’s central courtyard.

Some more detail of the castle.

One of the rooms of Bran Castle.

Related posts:

1. Turkish hospitality in Romania
2. A Minor Detour: Morocco, Madrid, Romania...
3. Ceausescu’s communist country came to a crude end on December 25, 1989

We plan on heading into Iran in three days and apparently Internet is very hard to come by, so I’ll try to get a few posts ready to be published automatically throughout the next week. I promise we will try our best to let you know how it’s going and our where abouts in Iran. I know how nervous some of you are about us going there, and how jealous the rest of you are. Ha, ha.

Anyways, for now, enjoy these photos. Ciao! –Laura–

The giant heads at the top of Nemrut Dagi in eastern Turkey. Behind them is an enormous mound, which Chris and I found even more impressive than the heads, because every little stone was put there by humans. It is supposedly the burial mound of the king, although no one really knows if his remains are truly underneath it.

One of the lions guarding the burial mound of Nemrut Dagi in eastern Turkey.

Chris pointing out that various types of cigarettes were listed in the dessert section in a restaurant in Brasov, Romania.

A lovely gate in Fez, Morocco.

A stop sign in Morocco.

Fez, Morocco.

An excellent example of the craftsmanship of Morocco found in the detail of a door.

Minutes before leaving camp and starting our 60 kilometer trek.

I laugh so hard when I look at this photo, I cry. Look at Chris! Poor guy is all beet down from the Sahara. This is him taking his last few steps of the 60 kilometer walk. Behold, the Erg Chigaga dunes lie just ahead of him.

Chris resting and Rashid cooking during our first lunch break of our 3-day trek through the Sahara.

Yeah! We’re on camels! As you can see I was extremely happy.

I’m riding a full loaded camel down a mini-dune. It was a little scary. It gets your heart going and blood pumping a little to remind you that you’re alive. That was a lot of weight on those thin camel legs.

Our camels and guide, Rashid, in the Sahara desert in Morocco.

Sahara desert, Morocco.

Chris walking through the Sahara desert.

Sahara desert trek. Note, you don’t ride the camels unless you arrange to pay for another camel so that you can ride instead of walk. This was not made clear to us before we started our journey. Ah well, it’s one walk I’ll never forget.

This is Amezrou, the old Jewish kasbah near Zagora, Morocco.

Chris and Mohammad, the man who arranged our 4-night, 3-day Sahara trek. He was very friendly.

Chris took this shot.

Marrakech, Morocco.

Marrakech, Morocco.

Marrakech, Morocco.

Essaouira, Morocco.

A candle holder in the Gothic cathedral in Milano, Italy.

A cyclist in Piacenza, Italy.

Chris looking handsome as ever at the top of Nemrut Dagi in eastern Turkey.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 5: Night of the Thousand Stars, Snakes, and other Deadly Encounters
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 4: Rashid, Pain, and More Pain

If you haven’t stuck your head out of a slow moving train and tried to catch leaves off of passing trees in the Romanian mountains, then you just haven’t lived, man.

As promised, here are some shots of our time in Romania. We only had a week there, so were only able to make it to Bucharest and Transylvania. Lucky for us, we also enjoyed some time with a fellow we met through CouchSurfing. Fatih is from Turkey, but is working in Bucharest. We had a great time with him and his friend Edit. Thanks again Fatih!

Our host in Bucharest, Fatih. He’s a scholar and a gentleman. This was taken in the Palace of Parliament, ostensibly the second largest building in the world, behind the Pentagon.

Laura channels her inner dictator from the balcony of the Parliament Palace.

The view from the top. At one time Bucharest was known as Little Paris, but some 35% of the old city was torn to the ground during the communist era to make way for wide boulevards and government buildings.

Fatih again, on the balcony.

And Laura.

Bucharest is a strange mix of old and new, communist tenements and giant billboards.

A boy sells flowers to motorists at a red light.

Fatih took us to the Romanian Village Life Museum. It’s like Heritage Park, but with black churches..

Laura and Fatih put their heads together.

Say what?!

Bucharest’s contradictions and complexities were strangely beautiful.

Art deco, art nouveau, it’s all here.

Tenements and billboards.

We took a train a few hours north into Transylvania. This is Brasov (Brash-ow). Notice the Hollywood-style sign on the mountain.

Laura takes a video clip from the gondola.

The view on the way up.

The Brasov sign from another angle.

Brasov felt very Germanic. It was really nice.

This castle is in Bran. And while Vlad Tepes, the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula, never lived here, we could use our imaginations. Actually the setting couldn’t be less dark and spooky. It was very pleasant.

Rapunzel, let down your hair.

Laura, looking beautiful as always.

Okay. We’re off to Nemrut Dagi, here in Turkey, so I have to sign off. We have some big news about some changes to our travel plans over the next few months, so stay tuned.

Related posts:

1. Ceausescu’s communist country came to a crude end on December 25, 1989
2. A Minor Detour: Morocco, Madrid, Romania...
3. Romania: Bran Castle and the truth about Dracula

An example of the grand, ecclesiastical architecture found in Bucharest, Romania.

After our time in Madrid and Morocco, it was refreshing to see the lush environment, farmer’s fields, foot hills and tree covered mountains out the train window.  The first thing I noticed about the buildings and houses outside of Bucharest were the roofs. They reminded me of a mixture between a barn and architecture commonly found in Germany.

However, within Bucharest we were constantly surrounded by massive, sad looking apartment complexes from the communist era, huge public parks and the few buildings  (like the ones below) that survived the 35% demolition of the city by communist leader Nicolae Ceausescu when he built numerous communist blocks. Prior to his rule, from 1965–89, Bucharest was known as “Little Paris”.  I’m not sure what it looked like then, but today it is a very architecturally interesting city.

Yet another example of the ecclesiastical architecture in Bucharest, Romania. Huge modern billboards mix with an architecture from the past.

We explored the most famous piece of architecture, the Palace of Parliament, with our CouchSurfing host, Fatih.

Fatih, enjoying some shisha at the Hooka cafe he took us too.

The building is 330,000 m² (3.55 million sq ft). In 1989 they had all the materials to complete the construction.  Construction was done around the clock and workers were extremely overworked.

The Palace of Parliament in Bucharest, Romania.

After enjoying a one-hour guided tour (offered every 30-minutes) I realized the building is not just big but absolutely over-the-top. Every hallway, staircase and conference room is constructed out of various types of marbles, numerous sizes and shapes of crystal chandeliers and more gold than I ever imagined. Power. If Ceausescu wanted to convey this, he succeeded.  The only hitch is the building is still not complete! Almost 10% remains to be built because construction ceased abruptly on December 25, 1989.

The memorial to those who died during the 1989 Romanian revolution, and the building in the background is where Ceausescu gave his last speech.

The balcony in the background of the photo is where Ceausescu stood on December 15, 1989 delivering a speech to his rather upset country.  The crowds jeering and political protesting resulted in the police opening fire.  Thousands of people took to the streets the next day and before Ceausescu could do anything about it, power had slipped from his hands.  He and his wife found themselves in front of a firing squad only five days later on December 25, 1989.  With that, Ceausescu’s communist country came to a crude end, one that you can actually watch on YouTube!  In memory of the people who lost their lives during the 1989 Romanian revolution this monument was constructed.

Related posts:

1. Turkish hospitality in Romania
2. Romania: Bran Castle and the truth about Dracula
3. A Minor Detour: Morocco, Madrid, Romania...

Hi all,

I figured we owed you all a proper update outlining our plans for the next little while, aside from the cryptic reference to detours and cheap flights in the last post. On April 26 we will be leaving Lanciano, heading north on a train to a town near Milan called Piacenza. Laura’s friend Christine will be living there by then, and we plan to visit with her for about 8 days before boarding a flight out of Milan for Casablanca, Morocco (!). This will be our first time in Africa and we are really excited. The Morocco plan only came about because we discovered some outrageously cheap EasyJet flights from Milan. After a bit of research, we learned just how affordable Morocco can be to travel in, and figured “why not?”

After three weeks in Morocco, on May 24 we will be flying to Madrid, Spain (another really cheap flight) for a short three night stay, before heading back to Milan. Our original plan was to get back to Istanbul so we could carry on eastward to Iran, but direct flights from Milan to Istanbul weren’t all that cheap. In fact, our entire trip to Morocco, Madrid and back cost less (150 Euros total) than one-way tickets rom Milan to Istanbul (180 Euros), so we decided we could spend our money better by catching another cheap flight into Bucharest, Romania, and then catching a train back to Istanbul. We have tickets all the way up to Bucharest already bought.

We intend to be back in Istanbul by early June, where we will continue eastward, probably entering Iran by about June 7 at the latest. We may or may not spend a week in Eastern Turkey seeing some of the country we didn’t get to when we were there last month. Our current visa for Iran is for 30 days, although it is apparently easy to extend it for a longer stay. As of now, we think a month is probably long enough. Our funds aren’t unlimited, and we certainly feel like we need to make our way further east into Asia sooner rather than later. The only pressures dictating all of this are the amount of money we have budgeted for the trip and a vague deadline of early October when Thailand goes through a bit of a hiring frenzy for English teachers. If the money starts to run out before then, we can fly to Thailand and get settled sooner. If we’re still able and willing to keep traveling, we can also find teaching jobs after this time, although we may have fewer options.

For a bit of a geography lesson, we’ve summarized all of this in the video above. Thanks for stopping by!

Cheers,
Chris

Related posts:

1. We’ve decided on a minor detour
2. Singapore-bound
3. Maroc, Morocco, Marocco