Begining of autumn, not too hot, but still no to cold, first autumn colors and empty week - so the idea is to explore Romania by car! Unfortunatelly we have only 9 days total with the road from Krakow, so more or less 7 full days in Romania, what is possible to see in suchshort period of time?!
- Where to stay?
- How to move around
- What to see
- Our experience - 1 week trip around Maramures and Transylvania regions
Where to stay?
Actually if you like comfortable stay in hotel or local accomadation, then you will be happy to here that prices in Romania is not very high, and actually in September there arer no so many tourists, so you should not book in advance, even on Transfagaras road it is possible to book accomadation 1 day before or even in the same day, or just come and ask about an empty room.
Prices for the room are different, and depends on the place and level of comfort, so booking as a help and you will find something for yourself for sure!
Other cheaper option is camping - in this case you can use organized campings, in most of them you will get place for tent on grassy area, toilet, cold or even hot shower, dinig area (sometimes it's just tables with benches, sometimes it's stoves, sometimes even microwave and fridge!). Some of camping has even reastaurants on the territory or kind of bar.
Camping is great option, as most of them, especially in autumn, you don't need to book in advance. There is only one issue with camping - if it's getting cold or it's raining you won't have comfortable place for spending and evening.
But as we are in Romania and you fell quite adventurous than you can stay in wild camping! Places where you can spend a night could be found in handful app as iOverlander, or you can use hiking map mapy.cz and find some place in the mountains, where you can hike.
Price of organised campings ussually for 2 persons, tent and a car is at least 2 times less than any other cheapest accomodation. But you know... there is always an exceptions.
We decided that we will mix and stay partially in campings during our active part of the trip, but as we need to work one day - we will stay in an appartment, so we can comfortably work and explore the city.
How to move around
As it's a road trip than it's better to have car or motorcyckle. For sure you can rent a car in the airport where you will come, but if you live not far away maybe it would be better option to just come with your own car. So we did it... just spent first and the last day navigating to Poland.
Romania has a lot of beautiful mountain roads and it's very popular among moto-tourists, but even in the car you will enjoy these amazing roads - forest and mountains around, sharp turns, multiple snake roads and what is the best?! - during the autumn there is no so many tourists, so even on Transfagaras we don't have traffic jams and queues to parking lots.
If you decide to go by public transport then you will miss all that amazing roads, as it's still possible I will definetely recommend to find a friend who want to rent a car or bring his own car and explore this amazing country on the wheels.
What to see
Romania is famous for it's nature and mountains ridges, actually it's the Carpathian ridge as in Poland and in Ukraine. What else is worth to see in Romania?
- Beautiful authentic villages, different in different regions of the country
- Sea shore, in the begining of the autumn sea is still warm, but tourists have mostly gone
- Hiking - there are plenty of options for one-day and multi-day hikes
- Explore Transylvania region - home of Dracula
- Danube delta - one of European biggest wetland
- The Maramures region - traditional wooden churches
- One of the most amazing roads in the world - Transfagarasan and Transalpina
Our experience - 1 week trip around Maramures and Transylvania regions
Maramures region
As we don't have too much time, we decided that it will be better to not try to cover the whole country, but to concentrate on smaller part. As we came from northern-west border we chose Maramures and Transylvania regions.
We started our trip with visiting some wooden churches and the merry cemetery. This cemetery became famouse because of it's brightly painted tombstones that in funny and a little bit naive way describe the person who is buried there. First we though that it somehow connected to special religious brunch, but actually no... in 1935 Stan Ioan Pătraș created the first funny epitaph and... now there are more than some hundreads of graves there.
And here the example of some epitaph from the cemetery (it's translated and adapted to give you an understanding how it sounds)
Here rests my dear old mother-in-law,
She talked a lot — and had no flaw.
But had she stayed just three days more,
You'd read my name upon this floor!
In the Maramures region there are many wooden churces and if you decide to visit them all I think you can spend here some weeks at least, so we stick with the most known churches along the road, like Barsana monastery. Even we visited it on Sunday when the holy mass is happening, it was open to public. Also it was a great pleasure to see so many people traditionally dressed who participated in mass.
Take a look at some more wooden churches along the way we went to Rodna mountains, it's also part of Carpathian ridge. In Rodna mountainsa there are plenty of hiking trails, but as we have just half of a day we chose to visit lake Iezer from Borsa village. Small mountain lake under the highest peak Pietrosul in Rodna mountains.
From the last parking place there is only 2-3 hours till the lake and then 1.5-2 hours you will return to parking - so great active half of a day.
As there are not so many campings near Borsa we decided to stay in camping offRoadventure - first we though it some kind of company, but then check into details and it's camping, as we don't have a lot of choices we went there and got an offroad adventure! Paved road ends and unpaved road start to climb upper and upper, as we were not on some AWD or enduro motorcyckle, but just common city car - it was definetely an adventure for us! But we did it and the camping was just great with authentic bar and owner from Holland who spent over a decade in Romania in this place.
Transylvania region
After our adventures in Maramures region we went south to Transylvania region and first on our way was the old saxon district, with saxon villages and fortified churches.
We visited some beautiful cities like Târgu Mureș and Sighisoara. Expecially I liked Sighisoara with it's historical city center on the hill behind th walls, with narrow streets and amazing atmosphere.
Fortified churches of Biertan, Saschiz, Viscri it's only that we visited, but there are many more of them. All that churches look like medival castles, but not like churches that we are used to.
Brasov town it's a place that is a must see on your way through Transylvania. Old city center, plenty of museums and some attractions nearby. So if you want to stay for some time in one place it can be your choice.
We just spent there some hours, walk on narrow streets, drink coffee in local cafe and go further.
The next very famous attraction it's Bran castle or Dracula castle, it's a place that is quite commercialized. The price is much higher that any other place and number of people near the entrance even in September was really high. So... we decided that we are not into going to such place, but better to climb a bit to great viewpoint to see the castle with all it's towers from outside and with the perfect perspective.
Actually that place is somehow not so popular, we've met just 1 person - but the view to the castle is unbeatable!
So just drive a little bit further, park your car, cross the river by small bridge, go through green lawn and climb by dirty trail till the metal cross from where you will see the best view on the Dracula castle.
Attention! If you are going to visit Tranfagarasen road check weather in advance or maybe you will see nothing! We checked and... decided to go faster skiping some other attractions, so we can be on Transfagarasan road during sunny day, as the next day when we planned to be there was the worst weather in the whole our week in Romania - wind, rain and cold.
So this time unfotunatelly we skipped Piatra Craiului national park and just go directly to the south part of Transfarasan road.
Stay in a camping near Vidraru dam we were suprised with electrical fence and many precautions... Bears are everywhere here
Early in the morning we were ready for our trip to Balea lake, and for sure for some meetings with bears, as we heard that you can't go by Transfegaras and don't meet any of them.
On our way to Balea lake there were no bears, and not so many cars also... So we just came there quite fast avoiding traffic jams that everybody is scared of.
Actually the Balea lake on it's own, from my perspective is not worth visiting... Yeap it still beautiful mountain lake that is bordered with parking lots, market stalls and people... So if you are into nature just park your car (if you early enough you can get a free spot along the road with locals, or just pay for parking) and go to mountains. Just behind Balea lake there are some trails, we chose to go to Caprei pass (Șaua Caprei 2315 m), see the lake Capra from the top, then hike to Capra peak (2494 m) and Vânătarea lui Buteanu (2507m) and return by blue route to Balea lake. The whole trek will take some hours and you will get an unforgettable views around!
So after trekking we went to the hotel (yes, this time we decided to stay at the hotel as it should be rainy and cold), check-in, wait till 5pm and went on the road as still we didn't see and bear, but we are already almost a week in Romania!
The road was empty, we are driving slowly near Vidraru dam hope to see a bear... And finally behind one of the turns we saw 2-3 cars stay in one place and brown bear just next to the road in the bushes!
It was a male, he allows us to make some pictures of him in greenery, then he went out to the road, even make some steps toward the car, but then just go further by the road and hide in the bush in 50 meters.
No feeding, no selfies with bear, not hands toward the animal. And that's actually how meet with a bear should looks like. Last years and some deathly accidents show that not everybody understand the rules and want to obey it. And Romanian goverment start to act, in 2024 they started to move the most habituated and aggressive bears to bear sanctuary not far from Brasov, to avoid next accidents. They also put boards with information about prohibition of feeding wild animals and fines, but... just on our way back to hotel we saw people feeding the fox :( as they move further we collected food and just pick it with us to through in trash bin.
Please do not feed wild animals in any circumstances!
As it turned out, due to the increasing number of incidents involving bears, the Romanian government decided it was time to take action. The bears that had become too accustomed to humans and showed aggressive behavior are now being relocated to a sanctuary, where they still live in the wild — but without contact with people.
After Transfagarasan road we moved to the Sibiu city, that is small but pretty city at the foot of South Carpathians. Historical city center is quite big, with the huge market square and amzing Saint Mary church on the smaller square nearby. Sibiu is beautiful and cozy city, that is great on the way and even for a small city break.
Sibiu was our last or pretty last point on the map as we are heading home, but still on the way there is a big historical city Cluj-Napoka, where you can flight directly from the whole Europe. Cluj is bigger, has bigger population, so some traffic jams, and sleeping districts, it's not so green as Sibiu, but still great to spend there half of a day, a day or even some days...
And we are going home...
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