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Following a rather successful trip through Zambia and Namibia together, in 2016 my mom suggested that the two of us embark on another international trip and dutiful son that I am I heartily agreed. Once again she left it to me to pick the destination and I selected Romania sort of out of the blue, mostly on the recommendation of a ten-year old student of mine who gave surprisingly good travel advice.
Long after the trip had been booked I was doing a little ‘net surfing and discovered that for the first time there was going to be an all-night Hallowe’en party/rave at Dracula’s Castle. Wow. I grabbed the calendar and a map and was elated to find that with a little pre-planning the stars could easily align to deliver me and my mom there then.
And they did.
When we pulled into the tiny town of Bran on October 29th we were still very near the beginning of our trip. We had just left Romania’s capital city of Bucharest that very morning, interrupting our 200 kilometre self-drive with a stop at the rather breathtaking Peles Castle along the way. In Bran we checked into our…it’s hard to call it a hotel but I guess it was, had a drink or two and walked to Dracula’s Castle.
(Okay, it’s not really Dracula’s castle but it is. Y’see, Dracula is a fictional character based on a real guy named Vlad the Impaler who was from Romania and did indeed have a castle*, though not this one. But when Bram Stoker wrote his Dracula book he had the ominously picturesque Bran Castle in mind as the home for his fictional vampire. So this wasn’t Vlad’s castle but it was the setting for Stoker’s character so it is Dracula’s Castle. Except that it isn’t.)
The sight of the monolithic structure looming from atop the hill was suitably impressive – just google a picture of it – especially lit up as it was in morphing swaths of colourful spotlights, a special feature created for just this evening. At the base of the castle was a lane sided with shops selling any manner of Vlad/Dracula kitsch and not just a little mulled wine, which served as a hearty treat on a nippy autumn evening. Up the middle of this lane was an astoundingly long lineup to get in to the castle for the party, so long in fact that my mother and I walked the length of it to make sure we wouldn’t be waiting unnecessarily, as we had pre-purchased tickets.
As we neared the front of the line we were accosted by a very drunk lady who somehow engaged my mother and I in an inescapable one-sided conversation that fortunately came with a readily shared bottle of wine. When the line started moving she clenched our arms and dragged us along with her small crew, and as reluctant as I am to ever butt in line we were semi-trapped and in a very good spot. We entered the castle in fairly short order just as a light rain was starting to fall. I mean, this random pull-in saved us at least an hour of rain-waiting. I felt as terrible as I did relieved. I assuaged my guilt with a fistful of complimentary vodka (which had been conspicuously dyed red); drinks were included in the admission price.
My mom and I toured the castle top-to-bottom, which was amazing. Not only was this the only time the castle had ever been open to visitors at night (which astounds me, for it was so very cool at night), for this one-off party different rooms of the castle had been stocked with actors in period costumes putting on a show. Vlad himself was there, as were his many sirens. We toured the bedrooms, the vast dining and living quarters, the very creepy and very real torture chamber replete with its horrific machines still in working condition, and of course the dungeon.
After we self-guided ourselves through the place we ended up in the courtyard hunting down more free drinks amongst a phalanx of screaming costumed hard-partying young people that were clearly just warming up for the long haul to a hard-fought sunrise. Coloured lights were flashing, techno music was BPM-ing, young ravers were raving, and all of it fuelled by tables full of free drinks pre-poured into half-empty plastic cups.
Though the party was slated to last until well into daylight we didn’t last nearly as long as that. After perhaps a half-hour in the courtyard we went outside to check out the late-night DJ tent and, finding it the complete opposite of what either of us were interested in we each grabbed a final cup of mulled wine for the road and staggered back to our temporary home through the shadowy lanes of Dracula-land beneath a nearly-full moon.
We stopped along the way so mom could pet a pony. Or perhaps it was a mule. I don’t know, it was dark out and I was keeping a look out for bats and black cats.
*Later in the trip I visited Vlad the Impaler’s actual castle, a much more ominous and much less picturesque structure that sits atop a mountain and requires an arduous climb up a full 1,400 slow, sweaty, stone steps (for reference, the CN Tower has 1,776 steps), an effort made primarily so I could add this footnote. I hope you enjoyed it.
Todd Man Out 