Yesterday, Erika and I drove from Budapest, Hungary to Kraków, Poland. Between the two metropoleis, lies the country of Slovakia, formerly joined with the Czech Republic as Czechoslovakia, but later splitting into two separate republics. Admittedly, we knew little about Slovakia, but since we were driving through it, we did some research. LonelyPlanet has this to say…
My last post was written when we first arrived in Bucharest, when my enchantment with Romania was brand spanking new. Since then, my enchantment has deepened quite a bit. Thomas, too, is quite smitten with this country. Someday, perhaps, we will move here. I have read and researched about the history and social structure of…
Erika likes to tease me that there are trigger words on brown road signs that she knows will spark my interest. Foremost among them is “fortification.” Anything big and old, I find fascinating. Yesterday, while driving from Sighișoara back to Brașov (this time via the highway) we past brown sign after brown sign that said “fortificata,” but…
Erika and I opted to avoid the highways as we headed out of Bucharest and, instead take a leisurely drive through Transylvania toward the smaller towns of Brașov (brash-ov) , a Saxon settlement, and Sighișoara (sig-i-shor-a), birthplace of Vlad the Impaler. Looking at the map, highways would certainly have been the faster route, but we wanted…
One day, Erika and I made the long walk across town to visit Bellu Cemetery. Located in southern Bucharest, it is a massive cemetery that houses many famous Romanians, such as writers, musicians, poets, generals, and politicians. It was gorgeous. In Your Pocket, Essential City Guides, describes it this way: Founded in the 1850s, this is…
Since the larger photo album can be intimidating due to the volume of images, this is an experimental post to see if we can break down our travels a bit better. If this is suitable, look for additional updates that backtrack a bit through our voyage. Below are the photos we took during a quick…
We arrived in Bucharest on Thursday afternoon, and as the bus entered the city I could feel, deep down at my core, that this city was completely, perfectly ‘me’. So much so that by the time we got to the apartment we are renting I had said to Tom several times that I wanted to…
After the amazing chance encounter with the Greek soldiers demonstrating changing of the guard, I was excited to see if we could watch the Bulgarian changing of the guard.
At the beginning of the video, the soldiers are coming out to change the guard. Their long stomping strides reminded me of toy soldiers with a hint of ballet technique.
After changing the guard, the troop returns to the barracks from whence they came. It was neat to see. I now want to see each of the different style as we progress and I regret not investigating if Turkey had one.
Below is an edited version of the video I shot. Some parts are shaky because I realized I was in their path and had to move out of the way. Enjoy!
The last five days we have been in Bulgaria, first in Sofia (the capital of the country) and now in a smaller city called Ruse (Rus-ah). After our long stretch in Greece (a little over 2 weeks), being in a new country feels strange. In Greece we had finally started to use some basic Greek…
