Romania trip report index
Part Four
Sighişoara is a lovely town. Pronounced ziggyshwara. It is fairly large when you count all the outlying suburbs but the historic part is the Citadel. It started life as a Church on a Hill, which became a fortress. It floats above the modern, lower town. It was built after the Tartar invasion of 1241 which scared the bejesus out of everyone so they fortified. Now it has hotels, inns, restaurants and more souvenir shops than you’d ever need. One thing though, it is a living town, not just a tourist area, with school children laughing through the squares and small streets, church bells calling the faithful.
Streets and scenes of Sighişoara.
We did the walking tour this morning. There are several gates and towers. Nearest our hotel is the Bootmakers Tower now housing the radio station. The main gate is the Clock Tower which is just next to the Monastery Church, now Protestant. There are also the furriers tower, the tailors tower, and the butchers tower. We hiked up the covered staircase, built in 1666 and has 175 wooden stairs. It carried the German school children to the school above. The school is just next to the Church on the Hill (Biserica din Deal), considered the most valuable historical monument in the town. It was built in the 13th century but stands on the site of a much older chapel.
Monastery Church
Main gate.
Mechanical clock in main gate clock tower.
175 steps up a covered staircase brings you to the German School and the Church on the Hill.
Door in the Church on the Hill.
Murals dating from 1483 were destroyed by a fire in 1776. A recent restoration brought back fragments of the frescoes.
Tombstones in the cemetery behind the church.
View from town up to the Church on the Hill.
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that Sighişoara is the birthplace of Prince Vlad Dracul aka Vlad the Impaler. He lived his first 4 years in this house, now a restaurant.
All the souvenir shops had T-shirts.
We had lunch in T. Josef Restaurant and Winebar just down the hill in the lower city. It was a pretty, dark paneled room with a great old bar. It was situated in the Park Central Hotel. It had good food and we decided to have dinner tomorrow evening there.
My tomato soup.
