When in Rom-ania!

Monday was pretty much the same as Sunday. We fluffed around for majority of the morning, organising accommodations, looking into things to do, etc.

We went to the Post Office first off to send home more random things. Our bags keep getting heavier even though we keep sending stuff back. Thankfully though the Bulgarian post was cheap (fingers crossed it makes it) and our load was 2kg lighter... for now.

After that we went down to the bus station to organise our ride across the Bularian/ Romanian border. Things dont run as nicely here on this side of the world, unlike Switzerland, so we had to spend a night at a border town (being Ruse) and then cross the border the next day.

With the tickets sorted we got to squeeze in a bit of tourist stuff. Basically the only thing I really wanted to do whilst on the coast of Bulgaria was go down and at least touch the Black Sea... so thats what we did. We also saw a naked man, but thats another story.

Once back at the hostel we made our first attempt at cooking in a hostel kitchen. Blehhhh. Maybe thats what made us sick....

That evening we then took the bus to Ruse. We arrived late and had no clue how to get to our hotel but once we did, we were so glad. The only "cheap" place in the town we got to stay at an english guesthouse. The host a loopy english men kept us up for half the night being a bit weird, but we were grateful for the cleanliness and native english speaking.

We had a look around the 5th largest city in Bulgaria the next day but neither of us were very interested. Not that we knew yet but we were both on the verge of getting "sehr" sick. That morning I saw a little boy that looked exactly like Nicolas. I had a huge cry in the middle of the street. I think Lacey was ready to chuck me in the looney bin. 21st October was Diana's b-day also... Happy Birthday Deee!

At 2pm we were in our bus which turned out to be a van. Crossing the border. I am proud to say that, yes, I now have a Romanian stamp! Yay!

BUCHAREST! Has to be the dodgiest city on the face of the earth. We arrived and half the drivers looked like they were on a suicide mission. We were holding onto our stuff for dear life because we had heard a few too many bad things about the people there.

Luckily we made it out of the city unharmed and caught a train to Brasov that evening. Both sick and tired by this stage Lacey had a hold of her stomach like she was ready to curl up and die and my glands are so swollen like I have golf balls in my throat.

Our hostel Kismet Dao was reccomended to us and it was ok if you like brown water running from the taps....Welcome to Romania ;-)

We met some nice people though and got a good chance to relax, watch movies and eat proper food. Romania is so cheap! So Wednesday was spent wandering around the city and taking in the sights. The sight of the first school in Romania was right next to our hostel and we got to see the Black Church which was built in the 1400's and survived the great fire that burnt down majority of Brasov.

On Thursday we did an organised tour of the castles,etc in the area. We paid some guy 70RON to drive us around for the day which turned out to be a huge rip off as we had to listen to rap music the whole time and hold onto our seats like it was our last car ride on earth but lots of people had told us that it was not possible to see all the sights in a day on public transport so we did the tour and we easily got to see all that we wanted to see. Firstly we went to a fortress in Rasnov and then we went to Bran Castle which is advertised as Draculas' castle but once inside there is no mention of Vlad Tepe or any blood sucking vampires.

It wasnt until we went to Sinaia that we really got a chance to see something special. The palace was really beautiful and we were lucky enough to have a guided tour. It was really informative and the palace was absolutely beautiful. The australian couple that we did the tour with were really good company also. They will be in Budapest when we are there so perhaps we will get to meet them again soon.

Once back at the hostel we made our way to the train station and then caught a train to Sighisoara. Lacey was pretty sick by this stage so she has spent the day in bed today whilst I went sightseeing with a few of the guys from the hostel.

After breakfast we headed to the History Museum. What a great place!

After climbing levels and levels of stairs once at the top we got a great view of the little town. Did you know that right now I am 15 478km away from home?

We also went to the Arms Museum, saw Draculas house and walked up a million stairs to the citadel and graveyard

... kinda scary!

This afternoon I was uber-productive doing a pharmacy-run for Lacey and I, doing a bit of shopping and posting more postcards.

I even tried to speak Romanian (which is alot like French) but the people only laugh at me and answer in English! Oh well!!

Tomorrow hopefully Lacey and I are well again and then we catch a flight to Budapest. We have both been there before but we love the city and look forward to seeing a few things that we missed last time.

Hope everyone has a great weekend. Love you all.

Love Megan