Wayfaring Travel Guide. Online travel map for destinations and sites around the world » Romania

The beautiful city of Brasov

Asya — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 06:55:45 +0000

Located at the foot of the Carpathian Mountains, in the centre of Romania, Brasov is one of the largest and most charming cities of the country. Founded in 1211, it is one of the best preserved cities in all of Europe. Brasov is home to a very pointy Orthodox church and one of the narrowest streets in Europe. Called “the Prague of Transylvania”, the old city was thoroughly restored to the delight of an increasing number of tourists.

Offering a wonderful old architecture and splendid setting, Brasov has always been an important cultural centre. A centrepiece in Brasov is the Black Church which was built in the 15th century. The name, Black Church, was adopted in 1689 following a sweeping fire that destroyed the town and blackened the church walls. Eighty-nine meters long, it is the largest religious edifice between Vien and Istambul. The church displays numerous icons and holds an extremely valuable Gothic chalice, created over 500 years ago by an unknown artist. The church is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Contemporary Brasov, with a population of about 400,000 is a busy industrial, shopping, tourist and cultural centre that offers the perfect escape for travels, adventure, cultural, and ecotourism. The Carpathian Mountains are the largest intact ecosystem of its kind in Europe. Surrounded on three sides by mountains, Brasov also makes a fabulous base for exploring the surrounding countryside where the air is clean and the people friendly. The geographic position and natural beauty, the great variety of the scenery and its contrasting aspects, the numberless historic and architectonic monuments make Brasov one of Romania’s main urban centres. The official website is: www.brasov.ro

The most beautiful opera houses in the world

Asya — Mon, 30 May 2011 13:15:54 +0000

Opera de Monte Carlo
Located in the principality of Monaco, the Opera de Monte Carlo was opened in 1879. Designed the magnificent and extravagantly, the opera house was recently renovated. Over 80,000 gold leaves were applied to paintings and moldings, a five-ton chandelier has been entirely rebuilt. As it seats only 524, it is often difficult to get tickets. This the only opera house in the world to feature exterior views (thanks to the windows overlooking the Mediterranean) from within the concert space.

Teatro di San Carlo
Located in Naples, this is the oldest opera in Europe that has never closed the door. Opened on 4 November 1737 and then it was the largest in the world with its 3300 seats. Teatro di San Carlo is included in World Heritage by UNESCO.

The Mariinsky Theatre
Opened in 1860, this is pre-eminent theater is located in St. Petersburg, Russia. Named after Empress Maria Alexandrovna, wife of Tsar Alexander II and there is a bust of the Empress in the main entrance foyer. The building was severely damaged during the 900-day Siege of Leningrad, but later restored in 1944. With its marvelous 1,625-seat auditorium it is one of the greatest world class music theatres.

Bavarian State Opera
Built in 1818, Bavarian State Opera is located in Munich and features an impressive exterior and a magnificent interior. Destroyed in World War II it was moved to another place and built in its original form. Re-opened in 1963, the State Opera seats 2,100 people. Today the opera is among the most famous in the world.

Teatro Amazonas
This opera is in the heart of Manaus, deep in the Amazon rain forest of Brazil. Opera House was constructed during the Belle Epoque – the era of rubber that makes Manaus one of the most prosperous cities on the continent. The dome of the opera is covered with 60,000 ceramic tiles imported from France and currently has 701 seats

Romanian Athenaeum
This concert hall is one of the most beautiful buildings in Bucharest. It was built in 1888 in neoclassical style by architect Albert Galeron and considered as one of the architectonical jewellery of Romania. The auditorium (28, 50 m in diameter and 16 m high) having a special acoustics, seats 600 in the stalls and another 52 in loge seating.

Shade Club

Asya — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 10:01:48 +0000

Located in a residential building in the center of Bucharest, Shade Club offers its visitors a creative design and an elegance and style atmosphere. Opened in 2008, it is one of the most modern and trendy clubs in the city.

The interior design of Shade bar was completed of Square One architectural studio. The decor is phenomenal. With classic bar, the graphic design on the wall is handmade and the light in Shade Club uses a RGB spectral tube system that runs on the perimeter – It’s hip and very cool place. Besides DJs playing sounds there are regular live events, with top local and even foreign bands. If your ever in the area be sure to make your way to this amazing club.

Fratelli Studios Club

Asya — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 13:34:18 +0000

Covers area of about 850 sq. m, Fratelli Studios Club is located in Bucharest, Romania. The Club is designed by the Romanian firm designer named Twins Studio and boasts a unique contemporary interior. Housed in a factory-like building, this night club offers a great design with large metallic pillars and metal beams.

The interior walls of the Fratelli Studios Club is covered with a large wooden blade, it’s for about 4 meters tall which is can be rotated along their central axis. The designer is placed the wooden bar in the center of the building surrounded by the seating area. The 4 rings decoration above the wooden bar gives the unique atmosphere.

Embryo Nightclub, Bucharest, Romania

Asya — Tue, 07 Dec 2010 22:16:22 +0000

The four-part logo of this night club in Bucharest refers to the organic theme that inspired its design: the various stages of development of an embryo. The entrance area leading into the windowless ground and basement floors is like a vagina; in the underbelly of the club a three-dimentional wall made of Comadur panels in the form of an oversized cell structure encloses the space. Complementing this variably colored, womb-like space, the rest of the interior fittings and the light membrane also imitate organic forms. The procreative process is also represented in the indirect lighting slots in the bar area, which are in the form of sperm cells.

Monastery Putna

iv — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 18:55:33 +0000

Putna Monastery (Romanian: Manastirea Putna) is a Romanian Orthodox monastery, one of the most important cultural, religious and artistic centers established in medieval Moldavia. The imposing Putna Monastery is situated about 30 km northwest from the town of Radauti , near the Putna River. Putna Monastery dates from the 15th century. The story goes that it was built in a general area picked out by Stephen’s advisor, Daniel the Hermit. A section of tree trunk containing the arrow hole is still kept in the monastery museum and a cross marks the spot from which the arrow was shot.

The building of the church lasted for three years, but the interior walls were only built in 1481. It is very likely that the church suffered several changes in 1484, following a fire. The largest bell of its belltower is said to have been heard all the way in Suceava when it was used to herald important events.

The exterior walls are not the smooth facades of earlier times, but two rows of blind arcades go around the building, smaller ones above the twisted stone cable, and tall ones below it. The thick walls are made of massive blocks of stone, and twelve buttresses support the walls.

The Tower of the Thesaurus is the only one left from the fortifications of Stephen the Great’s monastery. According to the plaque, it was built in 1481 and it was conceived as a two-floor building, with a terrace at the top, with a crenellated parapet. With all the transformations, it keeps unchanged the fortress aspect so characteristic for the great Moldavian monastery settlements .

DRACULA’S CASTLE – LEGEND AND TRUE STORY

Asya — Sun, 04 Mar 2007 14:38:58 +0000

When Bram Stoker wrote his classic novel, Dracula, he an entire genre of vampire movies, from the pallid horror and busty swooning of cheesy films like Brides Of Dracula to the angsty teenage smarts of The Lost Boys (‘My own brother, a goddamn, shit sucking vampire. Boy, you wait till mom finds out, buddy’).The first documentary attestation of Bran Castle is the letter written in 1377 by the Hungarian Ludovic I D’Anjou, giving the inhabitants of Brasov some privileges.The legend about Dracula - stoker’s story is based on the life of Vlad Tepes/Vlad the Impaler (1431-1476), a ruler revered by Romanians for standing up to the Ottoman Empire. Known as one of the most dreadful enemies of the Turks, Vlad started organizing the state and enforcing the law by applying death penalty and impaling all those he considered enemies: robbers, cunning priests, treacherous noblemen, beggars, usurper Saxons. In fact he fought against everybody who tried to replace him either by his step brother Vlad the Monk or by his cousin Dan the Young. The historians nicknamed him Vlad Tepes while people say he was Count Dracula because he used to sign with his father’s name, Dracul “The Devil”. Dracula is derived from the Romanian word for devil or dragon.
Castle Dracula – in 1459 Vlad the Impaler ordered hundreds of arrested traitors to build a fortress for emergencies above the mountain. The surrounding area belongs to Fagaras Mountains, which frequently are over 2,400 meters height. No prisoner survived. To revenge his wifeâ€™s death during a siege in 1461, he launched a large scale raid against Turkish Empire crossing the Danube river deeply into the Balkans. As a result of first proper â€œblitzkriegâ€ war of medieval history, Dracula killed 28,000 Turks so cruelly that he established a bloody reputation around Europe. This place inspired as much imagination as FF Coppola persuaded his fans with the myth of the Count Vampire of Transylvania. Still, legends and facts remained for centuries, far beyond just a fiction movie.His castle is supposed to be Bran’s Castle since its narrow corridors constitute a mysterious labyrinth of ghostly nooks and secret chambers easy to hide a “vampire”.
Situated only 28km southwest of Brasov, the Bran Castle is one of the most popular tourist site in Romania. The castle is perched atop a 60m peak in the centre of Bran village. The Bran mountain pass was the main route into Wallachia from Transylvania.Bran Castle is famous for its association with the Dracula legend. The 15th-century Wallachian prince upon whom the novelist Bram Stroker is supposed to have his blood thirsty vampire connected to the Bran Castle. In truth, Dracula may have attacked and briefly captured the castle in 1460, during one of his raids on the Burzen Land.
The castle has four towers. The oldest tower, Powder House Tower, houses the Cannon’s Gallery and the Gunner’s Room. During the 15th century, the Observation Tower and Eastern Tower were added. In 1622 the Gate Tower was added, a Polish attic was attached and the south curtain wall was thickened up to 3,5m thick. More renovations took place in 1723 and in 1883. The fountain in the inner yard conceals a labyrinth of secret underground passages. The tunnel opened onto the park grounds where the famous gardner Patula planted bushes brought from Balcic, dahlias and roses being the Queen Marie’s favorites flowers.

In the 18th century the fortress was the house of the Austrians frontier guards. In 1836 Bran became the official border and the defense role of the fortress was no longer a priority. In 1920, the Brasov Town council donated Bran Castle to Queen Maria of Great Romania, who lived there with the royal family till 1947. Since 1947 the Castle is opened as a museum. The fortified medieval Bran Castle is often referred to as Draculaâ€™s Castle, looking as a vampire counts abode should look with a forbidding facade, towers and ramparts rising out of the forest, and perched high on a steep cliff face against a dramatic mountain background.
This majestic castle still stands today in the Carpathian mountains….

The state of Romania wants to Buy Dracula’s Castle

nerdeff — Fri, 12 Jan 2007 14:03:37 +0000

The state of Romania has joined the EU recently and made one of its first announcements as a loud and clear: they want to buy the medieval fortress in Transylvania, Bran Castle which is also known as Dracula’s Castle back from the former royal family of Habsburgs.

The castle was confiscated from the Habsburgs by the communists after World War II and just last year the former royal family got it back through restitution. The fortress was never actually part of the Dracula novel by Bram Stoker’. However, Romania’s 15th century ruler Vlad Tepes who visited there, served as an inspiration for the author to write it. Ever since then the castle has been a tourist attraction.

Oh i was about to forget about the the price tag Romanian have in mind. And it is 60 million Euros.