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.

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.

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.

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 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.

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.

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.

The only Székely and Unitarian church in the UNESCO fortified-church site: a Gothic church with 1419 frescoes of the legend of Saint Ladislaus, whose fortress villagers still use to store their bacon.

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 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.

One of the largest Saxon fortified churches: a Gothic church on a cross-shaped plan, ringed by an oval wall with over 270 refuge rooms reached by timber galleries.

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.

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.