Where In The World Wednesday: Transylvania

It's Wednesday...which means it's time for Where In The World Wednesday, brainchild of Classy In Philedelphia. If you'd like to take part too, all you have to do is post a picture (or many like I do!) of someplace in the world. Don't forget to use the WITWW button in your post, and to visit Classy in Philadelphia later to post a comment on her WITWW, so that other participants can visit your blog too.

Today, I'm taking you to picturesque Transylvania, where, in keeping with our tradition of seeing in the New Year in chilly climes, B and I spent the last few days of 2008. Romania only joined the EU in 2007, and has yet to cause a blip on the mass tourism radar. The infrastructure still leaves something to be desired, but the beautiful mountains and forests, fairy-tale castles, and medieval towns and churches of this East European country provide plenty for visitors to see and do.

Transylvania is perhaps best known for Bran Castle, the setting for Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel, "Dracula". In truth, Bram Stoker never came near Transylvania...and the real "Dracula", the 15th century Wallachian prince, Vlad Tepes, better known as "Vlad the Impaler", did not reside at Bran. Although never accused of vampirism, his methods of execution....spread-eagled victims were bound and a stake hammered up their rectum, then raised aloft and left to die in agony....quickly earned him a certain notoriety.

Legend or not, on the gloomy winter's day that we visited Bran, the castle (perched atop a rocky peak) was looking every bit the "Vampire’s Lair".

Bran Castle

All this vampire-hunting can build up quite an appetite...so we went to sample the local cuisine at a restaurant specialising in game, including bear. Before you get too horrified, it's worth knowing a bit more about the bear population in Romania. Notorious dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu, who ruled for 25 years before the collapse of Communism, outlawed bear-hunting for all but himself and his friends. As a result, when Ceausescu was toppled and executed in 1989, the country's forests were teeming with brown bears, wolves and lynxes. Today, there are an estimated 5,500 brown bears in Romania, and that population is growing by 10%, or about 500 bears, every year. Consequently, Romania is one of the very few countries in Europe that permits limited bear-hunting during seasons that span half the year. In exchange for this rare hunting privilege, hunters pay a licence fee of between $15,000 and $25,000 per bear, depending on its size, which has been good for the tourist industry, and has brought badly needed revenues to this poor country's coffers.

But the hunting policy hasn't produced adequate results. Romania allows just over 300 bear licences each year, which isn't enough to keep the population in control, and the bears are increasingly descending from the Carpathian Mountains and raiding local towns in an effort to find food. This has led to a series of unfortunate encounters between humans and bears....

Luckily, however, the only bears we encountered on our trip were the stuffed and mounted ones on the walls of the restaurant...and, of course, the medallions of bear on B’s plate. Sensitive vegetarians look away now...he is gradually working his way down the edibles on Noah’s list, and has so far munched crocodile, frog (legs), escargot, kangaroo, goat, horse, wild boar, springbok, kudu, ostrich, pigeon, pheasant, guinea fowl.... and now bear. Apparently the taste of the meat that day was ‘bearable’. I had the vegetarian option (a plate of cauliflower and peas).

Restaurant "decor"

Eating so much meat can have adverse effects on one's figure....but luckily, help was at hand in the form of this apparently magic weight-loss slide....you appear to go in one size and shoot out the other end a leaner version of your former self...

Billboard in Brasov

I'll end with a random (but I thought funny) picture I took at the petrol filling station...

Glam granny on a quad bike

And this one of a winter wonderland, taken on a hike through a beautiful, silent forest on New Years' Day....

Forest Walk