Joly Hostel Sibiu

... but get the smallest bottle of .3L. Nice change from the Scotch. I also get some BBQ. Yum!

Off to Sibiu, our next stop, a couple hundred km away. We can either double back to Bran and take the major road or a short cut through some local towns. I urge the latter. It turns out to be lots of fun. Time Warp. While driving we found ourselves both in the midst of sheep and cattle that are being driven along the road. Lots of carts pulled by horses.

Signs are sporadic so driving ...

Sibiu is a delightful city, small - about 250 000 people, but ready to make your staying one of the best in Romania.
The city, on its German name Hermannstadt, was founded in the 12 century and in 2007 was Cultural European Capital.
The Bruckenthal Palace in the Big Plaza, today an art museum and the Evangelic Cathedral are worth a 2-3 hour visit.
Also, climbing all the way up in the Council Tower , the 12 century gate of SIbiu, let us see the city from above.
Great place!

For almost the entire time I've been writing blog entries, I have been dying to use this priceless pick-up line from my past (worthy of its own entry at the that time, but sadly for you, I was not a blogger then) as a blog entry title. Today, I witnessed the event worthy of this title, and it made me so, so happy.

I last wrote from Sighisoara, and honestly, not much has happened since that last entry. We spent a ...

... he stopped harrassing this one cat.

I have two roommates tonight. They are two girls from Montreal backpacking through Eastern Europe. They are also doing some couchsurfing along the way as well. They said that they have had some amazing experiences from it as well. It really is a great thing and I wished I would have done more of it. Next time I come back to Europe I will. I am already thinking that I would love to check out the Balkan countries.

... course to the dramatic view of the Fagaras mountain range (I believe it is the Fagaras).

Once I got to Sibiu it was a close walk to my hostel. The hostel has a really neat vibe to it and I was happy to see that I have a whole dorm to myself. It doesn't have security lockers so I am not too happy about that. At least I can lock my room. I desperately needed laundry done and I was able to do it here a few dollars.

Walking ...

... turistica pero en alrededores muy rurales. Hay pequenos comercios, campesinos y mucha pobreza en general. Hay una gran inversion en la restauracion de las viejas calles y edificios pero se siente como un lugar pobre. En el taxi a Sibiu te llaman la atencion los campesinos, los carromatos tirados por caballos, la gente labrando, los ninos trabajando en el campo, etc. Y en Sibiu... todo se disfraza de lujo ...

... of the city with Jellyfish as part of the celebrations. Near the restaurant there was a massive Jellyfish sculpture that talks at night. It took us a great deal of time to figure out what it was, everyone had a different idea of what it could be. Finally I stopped a policeman and between his English and a lot of amusing sign language by both of us, we figured out it was a Jellyfish. When we got to the pub street, we saw that there they had large inflatable Jellyfish over the street!

... tall meat extravaganza on Piata Mare, then passed out in a fleisch-induced coma until it was time to hit the town that night. Thanks to the Scottish/Romanian pair I ate breakfast with, I got the tip that there would be a New Orleans jazz concert that night just down the road from my hotel. To all who know me and my love of live music, this was the obvious place to be! In fact, when I asked the hotel concierge what was going on in the way of nightlife in Sibiu (it was ...

... countries (Bulgaria or Serbia) but not the more popular destinations like Czech or Poland. And some of them just spend long time wandering wherever without a set plan or schedule. In my outing group, two English guys (judging on their looks, they should be in their forties, or even fifties) have been on the road for possibly almost a year; A cyclist from Belgium planned to just bike around Romania, and maybe in Ukraine, in his one-month vacation; A ...

... courtyard type location. There was a semblance of a circular drive going back about two hundred yards. In the middle of the drive were three teenage boys without shirts or shoes (obviously not on their way to a restaurant) cutting the high grass with sickles. Ominous? Oh yes. The curious part of all this was that there was absolutely no semblance of a train station anywhere. Our driver seemed disoriented. He stopped the car at the rear of the drive and began looking around ...