Attractions in Transylvania

A medieval fortress built by the people of Brașov on a rock in the Bran Pass, later Queen Marie's summer residence and known around the world as “Dracula's Castle”.

John Hunyadi's Gothic residence, on a rock above the Zlaști river and reached by a long bridge on stone piers; inside, vaulted halls and towers from the 15th century.

A salt mine worked from the Middle Ages until 1932 and turned into a spectacular underground park: a Ferris wheel, a lake with rowing boats, an amphitheatre and salt walls 120 m below ground, near Cluj.

Romania's largest open-air museum, in the Dumbrava forest outside Sibiu: over 300 houses, mills, workshops and wooden churches brought from across the country, along ~10 km of paths.

A moated, bastioned fortress in the centre of Făgăraș, seat of the princes of Transylvania in the 17th century and now home to the Făgăraș Land Museum.

The capital of the Dacian kingdom, hidden in the beech forests of the Orăștie Mountains: the walls of Decebalus's fortress, the paved road and the sacred area with andesite and limestone sanctuaries, a UNESCO site.

The Baroque palace of Governor Samuel von Brukenthal on Sibiu's Great Square has housed Romania's oldest museum since 1817: a gallery of European painting with van Eyck, Titian and Bruegel.

Transylvania's largest Baroque aristocratic residence, gutted in 1944 and being brought back to life by an award-winning training site; neo-Gothic façade, lapidarium and an exhibition on Miklós Bánffy.

A medieval peasant fortress on a rocky hill above Râșnov, looking out to the Bucegi and Piatra Craiului mountains; the upper enclosure is under restoration, but the Fortress Garden and Báthory Tower are open.

A narrow limestone gorge in the Piatra Mare Mountains near Brașov, with seven rock steps climbed on metal ladders and walkways; at the top you can ride a zip line back down.

The finest Baroque palace in Transylvania, built between 1774 and 1785 on Cluj's Union Square, with classical statues along its attic; it houses the Art Museum, with five centuries of Romanian and Transylvanian painting.

Romania's largest glacial lake, at 2,040 m in the heart of Retezat National Park; it can only be reached on foot, after a climb of about two hours from Poiana Pelegii.

Romania's only volcanic lake: an almost round sheet of water in the Ciomatu crater, ringed by forest, with a Catholic chapel on the shore and the Mohoș peat bog in the neighbouring crater.

A spa resort 15 km from Sibiu with salt lakes formed where old salt mines caved in: in summer you swim in water that keeps you afloat, between white banks of salt.

A masterpiece of Transylvanian Secession architecture, completed in 1913, with a gold-ground mosaic façade, the Hall of Mirrors and its 12 stained-glass windows, a concert hall with an organ and the Mureș County Museum's art galleries.