4th of July 2025 – Travelling home from Bucharest

This will be my last entry for this holiday as I am flying back to the UK later today.  I have been staying in the Hotel Marmorosch while in Bucharest; the hotel is a converted bank.

3rd of July 2025 - Snagov Palace and Vlad the Impaler

Snagov Palace, again very opulent, is a historic royal residence which has been built on the shores of Lake Snagov, northeast of Bucharest.  We drove up to the palace through an extensive wooded estate frequented by a number of wild animals, none were to be seen.  Snagov Palace was built by Prince Nicolae, brother of King Carol II, between 1930–1932.

Nicolae Ceaușescu extensively renovated the palace in the 1980s even adding a gym and swimming pool.  On the 22nd of December 1989 Ceaușescu briefly fled to Snagov Palace by helicopter from Bucharest during the Romanian Revolution before being captured.

We had to wear blue plastic covers for our shoes to protect the beautiful wool rugs in Snagov Palace.

 

The final resting place of Vlad the Impaler, also known as Vlad III or Vlad Dracula, is shrouded in mystery and debate.  “Dracula” means “son of Dracul”, a title Vlad inherited from his father who was a member of the Christian knightly order "the Order of the Dragon".  The link between Vlad the Impaler and Count Dracula is a fascinating blend of historical fact and gothic fiction including Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula.  Stoker never explicitly stated that Vlad was the model for Count Dracula however the name, the Transylvania region and dark legacy suggest a strong influence.  We visited Snagov Monastery, situated on an island in Lake Snagov, which has long been believed to be Vlad’s burial site due to local legends and historical ties.  Excavations in the 1930s revealed no human remains in the tomb, only animal bones.  One alternative theory is that Vlad's burial site is at Comana Monastery situated near the battlefield where Vlad was reportedly killed in 1476.  Despite the intrigue, no theory has been definitively proven.

In the evening some of us went on a Romanian foodie tour with a local guide to taste authentic Romanian flavours.  Each of our three courses were held in a different restaurant.  The most amazing course was the traditional Romanian dessert Papanasi which is made from cow's cheese, eggs, sodium bicarbonate and flour.  Papanasi is similar to a fried doughnut topped with a doughnut ball and served with sour cream and berry jam.  This dessert was delicious but so large that I gave up halfway through.

2nd of July 2025 - Bucharest

Today we disembarked our ship in Giurgiu and drove through the countryside to Bucharest.  Bucharest began as a fortress in the 15th century and saw glory days as the summer residence of the Wallachian princes.  The city was burned to the ground by the Ottoman Turks then Austria-Hungary and imperial Russia fought over it for a century. Wallachia and Moldavia united to form Romania in the mid-19th century; after this Bucharest enjoyed a prosperity that was reflected in its extravagant architecture, some of which manage to survive World War II bombing and communist building programs.

 

On reaching Bucharest our first visit was to the colossal Palace of Parliament which is one of the largest office buildings in the world.  This building was too large for me to be able to take a picture of the entire building so I took a picture of a model of the building.

The Palace of Parliament was ordered by Nicolae Ceaușescu, the last communist leader of Romania, but was not completed until eight years after his death.  The Palace now houses the Romanian Parliament and three museums.  We visited the Senate area of the Palace of Parliament, which was opulent to say the least, filled with crystal chandeliers, mosaics, marble, gold leaf, and stained-glass windows.

 

A new cathedral is being built close to the Palace of Parliament.

We were given a coach tour of Bucharest city before arriving at our hotel in the old town of Bucharest.  This included Bucharest’s very own Triumphal Arch, modelled after the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, and sites where protests brought down Ceaușescu’s regime in 1989.

The day’s sightseeing ended with a short walking tour of the old town of Bucharest where we visited the rather lovely Stavropoleos Church.

1st of July 2025 - Ruse

Bulgaria’s foremost Danube port, Ruse is sometimes called “Little Vienna” for its elegant 19th-century mansions and public buildings.  We were meant to arrive in the morning however this was delayed until midday because of low water levels in the Danube.  Our captain wanted to negotiate a particular stretch of the Danube in daylight rather than overnight as planned.

I had planned to go a full day excursion today but this would have meant more coach travel than planned because the ship was moored in Nicopol instead of Ruse; also we are in the middle of a heat wave.  Instead I spent the morning just relaxing onboard and enjoyed cruising down the Danube to Ruse.

In the afternoon I did a short walking tour of Ruse.  We visited Freedom Square which takes its name from the Freedom Monument.