Attractions in Romania

A Saxon peasant fortress climbing in tiers up a basalt hill above the town of Rupea, first recorded in 1324 and restored in 2010–2013, with wide views over the Transylvanian hills.

A spa resort more than two centuries old in a narrow valley of the Nemira Mountains: numbered mineral springs you drink from for free, a park with shaded paths and the 1894 Art Nouveau Casino.

An 8 m conglomerate rock shaped by wind, frost and rain that, from certain angles, looks like a human head; it stands on the Bucegi plateau at 2,216 m, next to Babele.

A thermal and wellness complex on the edge of Bucharest, on the DN1: geothermal pools under a glass dome full of palm trees, water slides, saunas and a sandy beach open in summer.

A roughly 15 m waterfall on the eastern slopes of the Bucegi Mountains, an hour's easy forest walk from Bușteni; the most visited waterfall in the massif and a classic outing on the Prahova Valley.

A roughly 30 m, two-tiered waterfall at the foot of the Vlădeasa massif, on the Stanciului valley near Răchițele; the water fans out over the rock like a veil, and in winter the frozen wall is an ice-climbing spot.

The last village on the Romanian coast, a kilometre from the Bulgarian border: two kilometres of fine sand, terraces open until dawn and the waters of a marine reserve.

A spa resort more than two centuries old in the Dorna Depression: carbonated springs, peat mud, a park full of squirrels and the Spa Casino, restored and reopened as a museum.

The roughly 1,100 ha Neajlov marsh in Comana Natural Park, with channels, reed beds and waterbirds, less than an hour from Bucharest; seen by small boat, rowing boat or kayak.

The Movilă family's fortified monastery, built in the 1580s among the hills of Bukovina, with a church painted almost entirely inside and out and the famous "Ladder of Virtues"; a UNESCO site.

The wild beach where the Sfântu Gheorghe branch meets the Black Sea: 30 km of fine sand, 2 km from a Delta village that can only be reached by water.

Romania's easternmost beach, where the Sulina branch meets the Black Sea: very fine alluvial sand, an unusually wide strip and water that stays shallow for tens of metres.

A wild beach of shell-strewn sand at the village of Vadu, inside the Danube Delta Biosphere Reserve: low dunes, not a single building and an earth track down to the sea.

The only marine reserve on the Romanian coast: the waters between 2 Mai and the Bulgarian border, with stone reefs, brown seaweed beds and mussel banks to see with a mask or on a dive.

A Romanesque basilica from the turn of the 12th and 13th centuries, left almost unaltered, on the rocky top of St Michael's Hill, ringed by a defensive wall and looking out to the Făgăraș Mountains.