Tour to Corvin Castle in Hunedoara & Alba Iulia

Our guide was great (I do not remember exactly his name now, Frison?). He was right on time to leave, what is much appreciated. We had interesting conversations about Romanian culture, economy and social situation. While chatting you do not feel the time you pass sitting in the car. Without a car it would have been difficult to reach these two places, since they are out of the typical Romanian sites people want to visit. Big mistake, since both of them are quite impressive. So booking a tour is a good option. It takes a while to arrive and go back. There are also tours to Corvin Castle and Alba Iulia leaving from Cluj-Napoca, but I would not recommend them because it would take even more time, better leave from Sibiu. We loved everything in the tour, not only the main attractions but the views in the way there. Corvin Castle was magnificent and without a guide the experience would have been different since we did not know the history of the place. So knowing what happened there, who were the main characters who played an important role no only in the history of the castle but also of the whole country was a great plus. The tour did not feel rushed at all. We had enough time to see around without feeling we were hurried to keep going. I just would have liked the guide to not smoke during the tour. In the Alba Carolina fortress there is going to be a lot of time under the sun. So, if you do not like sun, like me, use sun cream or take an umbrella.

We toured with Marius from South Carpathian Travel Centre. He was engaging and shared his knowledge from the beginning of the tour. We liked the tour as it brought us through different time periods in Romania's history: Sarmizegetusa Regia during the Dacians and Romans, Corvin Castle which is medieval, and Alba Iulia which is a mixture of Roman and medieval. Do note that the tour will be a bit long due to the far distances between each location: minimum of 1.5-2.5 hours driving time between each location. We started off with going to Sarmizegetusa Regia which will give different views depending on which season you visit. We were there in winter and many of the stones were still blanketed with snow - the silver lining was that it offered us with amazing winter wonderland photos. And the sacred zone of the area was still visible like Stonehenge but with timber posts. We then headed to what was our highlight of the tour - Corvin Castle in Hunedoara. It has to be one of the largest medieval castles we have ever seen! Favourite castle in Romania for sure. The tour ended with a walk-around Alba Iulia, which has an interesting star-shaped fortress to witness. Highly recommend this tour but the long drives and also the 1 km hike to Sarmizegetusa Regia will make it a tiring day. Marius was entertaining and even shared with us aspects of Communist life in Romania and told us about the Dacia car.