I always thought Transylvania was a place that only existed in books and movies, full of transsexuals like the Rocky Horror Picture show, but I was about to find out that it was a real place, located in Romania.

Landing at the Bucharest airport, the place looked like any other small airport, similar to Alicante of Spain or Ciampino of Italy. It was only once we got outside that the place began to look different. Very different. Picture Bucharest a bit like…. Hmmm…. Downtown Bagdad.

Driving on the road was more a battle of survival than transportation. There seemed to be no road rules, there were traffic lights that no one obeyed, and people were begging in the middle of the road. We started looking at each other like “Hope it’s just like this in Bucharest”. Well it kind of was…

As we got further out of Bucharest we started to see a difference in scenery. More and more fields, less and less cars. Soon the only things that inhabited the roads were people on Horse and Cart. It was like going back in time 100years. People were living in humpy’s, surviving only from what they could grow themselves, with kids ploughing fields by hand. It was amazing to see. I started to picture my life like that, you know, no Ipod Nano, no Gamecube, no Mobile…. FAARRKK.

My latest generation Tom Tom GPS didn’t work in Romania, so Al stepped up as my navigator and began reading from a map we’d downloaded from the internet. Seemed like roughing it a little to me? Curtea De Arges was the destination point where our ‘Pension’ (Hotel) for the night awaited. It was situated near a castle who’s ruler impaled live Turkish invaders who threatened to take over the region. This castle belonged to no other than ‘Vlad The Impaler’ commonly known as DRACULA!

Now Dracula actually was a real person. Let me fill you in.

Dracula was the 15^th century ruler Vlad Tepes (1431-1476) whom Bram Stoker’s fictional novel is loosely based upon. The word ‘Dracula’ is derived from the Romanian word for devil or dragon. Vlad Tepes gained notoriety for the way he impaled his enemies on sharp stakes, and was nicknamed ‘Dracula’ by his adversaries, and ‘Vlad The Impaler’ by his country men. Vlad Tepes is widely revered by Romanians for standing up to the invading Turkish army and expanding the Ottoman Empire…. Thank you Google.

So on arriving at our first overnight stay we met our host for the evening Marcel. The thing that struck me first was just how much this guy really looked like a Dracula I’d always imagined in my mind. With a bigger Widows Peak and a set of Fangs this guy could star in the movie. The only thing that blew me out more was when we met his wife Maria. She was the closest real life version of Morticia Adams I‘ve ever seen. A very attractive woman with piercing dark eyes and straight black hair. Marcel and Maria were the owners of the Serbanoiu Pension and by all rights fantastic people. They prepared a meal for us all, told us some local legends and stories, and even shared some of their Romanian Schnapps ’Palinca’ before we went to bed.

The night was a real warming experience, and they proved to be fantastic hosts. It was almost like we were returning old friends. Maybe they were….. Doo DOO Doo DOO. Just kidding.

In the morning Marcel even offered to play tour guide and show us the sights. He took us to a Princely Court (looked like a Church to me) built by some bloke named Manole who was the best Stonemason of the time(14^th Century). Legend has it his first couple of attempts fell to the ground, so he decided he had to make a sacrifice for his next project to stand. After much discussion, it was decided what better person to sacrifice than his dear old wife? So the story goes his wife was bricked into the walls alive as she screamed for mercy. I bet that taught her a lesson for interrupting him during the footy… For your information, the building still stands. Must have been right.

After that we headed to the real life Dracula’s Castle, were he held off the attacking Turkish army and impaled those he captured. The Castle is at the top of a huge mountain which has over 1500 steps leading to the summit. Mum’s knees aren’t any good these days, so she and the girls opted out of the climb. Me, Alex, Dad and Marcel however were headed for the top. It really was a decent climb, and about halfway up I didn’t know if Dad was going to make it all the way or have a cardiac arrest. He soldiered on behind us and eventually we reached the Castle. It was easy to see whilst climbing the hill with paved steps carved into the mountain, just why this castle would have been so hard to attack. Imagine climbing up a cliff face, dodging arrows and fireballs whilst seeing your mates perched up on stakes like shish kebabs. Bugger that.

After getting some pics at the top and looking around a bit, we headed back to the girls and onto our next part of the trip. It was however time to say good bye to Marcel. If anyone reading this ever plans to visit Romania and Dracula’s Castle, I recommend you stay with these guys. They truly were great people.

On the road again we headed towards Sighisoara, and reached the town Sibiu, built in the 12^th Century. Sibiu was voted the ‘Centre of Culture for 2007’. I’ve got no idea why. It is the place however where the remains of Baron Von Frankenstein (The character Mary Shelley’s FRANKENSTEIN is loosely based upon) still lay. Baron Von Frankenstein was actually executed by Vlad Tepes in the 15^th Century…. I’m not making this shit up!

A few hours later, not far from our destination of Sighisoara we saw a heavy car crash just up ahead. It was a head on and everyone stopped immediately. Driving slowly closer to the wreckage we witnessed something none of us ever want to see ever again, a dead body hanging out of the car. With people and Police already on the scene, I kept on driving towards our hotel. It was a pretty hard thing to see, and for the next hour or so nobody talked much at all.

That night we stayed in Sighisoara in a weird little room Amy and I shared with Alex and his Amy. We were to discover in the morning it was less than 100metres from where Dracula was actually born. Sighisoara dates back to the 3^rd Century BC and is the oldest Citadel in Europe. A ‘Citadel’ is a town enclosed within a wall… Man I learnt some shit on this trip. After checking out where Dracula was born it was back on the road for the longest driving leg of the trip. This night we stayed in ‘Hotel Dracula’ the place where in Bram Stoker’s novel, Dracula’s Castle actually stood. This of course is fictional, but we did retrace his steps on the way to the Hotel and his description of the surrounding area’s was frighteningly close in every way (Remember his novel ‘Dracula’ was published in 1897)… Spooky.

The next day we headed towards Brasov but stopped at the Bran Castle on the way through. This place is what most people know as Dracula’s Castle from movies and stuff, but in actual fact he never lived here. He was however imprisoned in the Castle for a few weeks after being captured during a siege. This place was pretty boring to me and I was just keen to get onto Brasov and kick back. We were also going to stop at the “reputed” burial place of Vlad in Snagov, but like most things we had discovered “reputed” must mean “bullshit” in Romanian. They should have had in the description of the hotel room in Ursa a “reputed” Spa bath, or a “reputed” air conditioner in the Casa Verda Hotel, coz they were… bullshit.

Brasov was nice. Of all the towns and places I saw in Romania, I liked this one the best. It was the cleanest and most colourful, and the only place I really felt like I wasn’t about to be gunned down in a drive-by. We stayed there the night and headed back to Bucharest the next day.

Flying out of Bucharest meant this was the end of our trip. Alex and his Amy were off to England, we were headed for Austria and the folks were flying back to Oz. I’ve got to say that although we risked being taken hostage, barely survived the breakfasts at the hotels, and reached Jedi levels in Dracula knowledge, Romania was a good experience to see. Once.

The worst thing was doing it all without my sister Desi, who was stuck at home looking after the shop. It would have been nice if she’d been with us all.

So after all the good byes, we all went in our different directions and back to our normal lives. This more or less brings you up to date. Next year we plan on doing something else, something that doesn’t include Vampires. Stay tuned….