DailyDirects does its first site visit!
After a year of writing about places that I only visited from the luxury of my laptop, I figured that it was long overdue for an actual visit to a DailyDirects destination. Which lucky location received the honour of my presence? Why Bacău, Romania of course.
What brought me to Bacău?
To be honest, I never had any burning desire to visit Romania’s twelfth largest city. But Bacău beckoned in January with an invitation to attend the wedding of my friend Catalin and his wonderful wife Andra in June. I was honoured to be invited and intrigued to see what this part of the world was like – I had to be there!
The first challenge was figuring out how the heck to get there from The Netherlands. As you can see in the map below, Bacău is situated in north-eastern Romania close to the border with Moldova and about a five hour drive from Bucharest, Romania’s capital city. Not exactly the easiest place to get to for a weekend visit! However, my dilemma was solved when I discovered a direct flight with to Bacău from Brussels with Romanian low-cost carrier Blue Air. Serendipitously, the two flights per week that connect the cities were perfectly timed for my visit.
“All that is good for the body and soul”
Before I arrived in town, Catalin briefed me on what to expect at a Romanian wedding. He informed me that the party would start on Saturday morning and go all night, with lots of food and booze (as he put it: “all that is good for the body and soul”). He was not wrong!
I arrived in town late on Friday night and was picked up at the airport by Catalin’s friend Marius. It is difficult to gather first impressions of a place when you arrive late at night, but my “we’re not in Kansas anymore” moment occurred as soon as we left the airport’s parking lot: I was quite surprised to see (and feel!) that the road into town was not paved or illuminated. Thankfully, that part of the journey was brief and we were at my hotel in no time at all. Knowing a full agenda awaited me on Saturday, I went straight to bed after checking in.
We started the morning at his family’s apartment in the city, where we helped him get ready for his big day. The booze was flowing and a traditional Romanian band was playing, but I made sure to pace myself. From there, we drove out to pick up the bride at her parents’ place in the verdant countryside which surrounds Bacău. The eating, drinking, and dancing continued before we all headed out to the church for the wedding ceremony.
The ceremony took place in an ornate Orthodox Church in the centre of Bacău. It was a wonderful ceremony, despite my not understanding exactly what was being said, given that it was conducted in Romanian. (As a side note, Romanian wasn’t entirely incomprehensible to me since it’s a Romance language that is somewhat similar to Italian). After it concluded, we had a couple of hours to rest up before the main event later that evening, so I went back to the hotel for a power nap.
Party time!
I arrived at the venue at around 8pm, where we were promptly served coffee and cake – the caffeine and sugar would help keep me going for the long night ahead. It was a smart move to serve each course of the meal in two hour intervals, as it helped keep everyone going throughout the festivities. The main course was served past midnight and the cake was cut at about three in the morning! After a few glasses of Moldovan wine, I was ready to hit the dance floor. My usual free flowing dancing style was put to the test by the more coordinated and collective Romanian wedding dance:
With the sun coming up, I went to bed for a few hours of slumber before heading back to Andra’s parents’ place in the countryside for a delicious barbecue on the Sunday. I surprisingly got more intoxicated at the barbecue than I did at the wedding due to sampling their next door neighbour’s homemade hard alcohol on an empty stomach. Thankfully there was plenty of meat and fish on hand to save me from getting too out of sorts.
A little time to explore
As my flight didn’t leave until Monday, I had some time to myself on Sunday evening to explore Bacău. The city itself seems to be dominated by Communist-era architecture, with some newer buildings interspersed. I was impressed to see how they closed off the city’s main street to cars on Sunday, which made for quite a bustling scene. However, what most shocked me in my meander through town was the local McDonald’s, which was so jam-packed that they had to employ security guards to control the crowds. I was told it would be a half-hour wait before I could even step inside, so I turned back, McFlurry-less. I managed to finish my tour of the town with a quick beer and a bite at a local craft brewery, which capped off my visit to Bacău.
Direct Flights to Bacău
Romanian low-cost carrier Blue Air flies direct to Bacău’s George Enescu International Airport from Belgium (Brussels), Ireland (Dublin), Italy (Bergamo, Bologna, Rome, and Turin), Spain (Madrid), and the UK (London and Liverpool).
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