A Day in Sighisoara

Yesterday, I set out from Brasov to do some sight-seeing in Sighisoara. (Pronounced SIG-eh-SCHWAR-ah). Sighisoara is a well-preserved medieval city and was recommended by my guide book, so I took a bus from my hostel to the train station, and got a return ticket at the train station.

My train to Sighisoara was uneventful. I was in a compartment with three well-dressed Romanian women who chatted to each other the whole time, and shared their chocolate with me. They also communicated that they liked my boots. It was a nice, fairly modern train and it was an express - a little under two hours from Brasov to Sighisoara.

When I got to the tourist office, it was closed, but I figured I could just walk towards the tallest thing in town, which turned out to be this church:

Once I reached the church, I found where I could easily cross the Tarnava Mare river and go up to the Citadel - the fortified city. Reaching the citadel involved climbing a lot of stairs.

The old city was an interesting medieval city - an interesting contrast from the "old city" areas I had wandered through in the South of France. A lot more fortifications here.

I learned that the rectangle is the rudest shape - this one walked right into my picture:

Sighisoara is the hometown of Vlad Dracul, father of Vlad Tepes, aka Vlad the Impaler, who is supposedly the basis for the Dracula legend. Vlad Tepes was born and spent his early years in Sighisoara. This plaque commemorates the house where he supposedly lived - the house itself was nothing special.

I can't believe I brought my trumpet all this way for nothing:

Looks suitably medieval:

This picture isn't of anything special but I'm taking a moment to be "artsy" - I really like all the vertical and horizontal lines in the picture.

Beautiful Sighisoara from the top of the citadel. Very picturesque:

The sky looked really beautiful at sunset. It made the whole town look pink but I couldn't quite capture this in a picture:

However, noticing the sunset made me remember that staying out after dark in Dracula's hometown was probably an unnecessary risk, so I hurried back to the train station. I hopped on the next train back to Brasov. This turned out to be less nice, but more interesting than my first one. It was a "local" train, so it stopped at all the tiny Romanian villages between Sighisoara and Brasov. The poverty here is more noticable than anywhere else in Europe, and at times it felt like going back in time. In this town, horses and carts were waiting to meet the train and a lot of the passengers climbed aboard the carts after disembarking the train:

(Also, I realize the horse in the right of the picture looks ridiculously thin but I think that's just because there was a bright light on his other side - he did not actually look emaciated. I knew some of you might worry.)


When I got back to Brasov, I ate some dinner and went back to my hostel.

I had planned to go to Bran today but sadly when I woke up this morning, I was feeling quite under the weather. I laid low today and have every intention of going tomorrow - I feel much better already.