Good morning from Romania!

Disembarkation day. Everyone off the ship, and onto the herd buses by 0745 for the 1-1/2 hour drive to Bucharest.

Beautiful sunrise as we left the ship.

The Herd Tour d’Jour

Our herd tour today was 8-1/2 hours. This was 6-1/2 hours past my herd tour patience limit.

Saw a lot of rural Romania on the drive to Bucharest: lots and lots of legacy communist structures in various stages of decay. Arriving into Bucharest – the architecture is definitely more attractive than what we saw in Serbia and Bulgaria. BUT, the drab communist block buildings are still everywhere. They will probably always be a fixture in Eastern Europe.

The National Opera House

First stop in Bucharest: the National Opera House. Built in 1953 – in full communist glory. Bright red velvet seats. Because what other color would they be? Honestly, way more comfortable than most NYC Broadway seats, which were designed for children and very compact adults. Got to peek backstage – found a really cool art canvas, which I considered liberating.

The Ceaușescu’s

Romania really got the short end of the communist stick under Nicolae Ceaușescu’s dictatorship. By all accounts, he and his wife were both terrible human beings. They ruled through fear, repression, and extreme control over everyday life. Our guide told us that everyone was spying on everyone during the 1980s.

Sidebar: If you want to read a really great historical fiction book about Romania in the 1980s, pick up Ruta Sepetys’, I Must Betray You.

Under Ceaușescu’s dictatorship, Romania was suffocated by censorship, the secret police, and brutal punishment for anyone who dared to disagree. Ceaușescu’s policies caused widespread poverty and suffering. During the 1980s, food, electricity, and heating were rationed so severely that many families struggled to survive cold winters. And Elena Ceaușescu’s influence only made things worse, as she gained enormous power despite having zero qualifications. The Ceaușescu’s were the picture of arrogance and corruption.

The Spring Palace

As the Romanian people suffered, the Ceaușescu’s lived in unchecked gaudy opulence. We walked through Ceausescu’s Spring Palace in Bucharest. Our guide sounded *exactly* like Gru from Despicable Me.

If you are not familiar with Gru, please play this short video so you get the proper inflection.

Rule #1 from our guide: absolutely no photos allowed inside the house. So, of course I took some stealth photos. Please enjoy the jaunty angles. Here we have Ceausescu’s Persian carpets and a couple of random velvet dictator chairs. Ceausescu’s bedroom suite was all gold. Gold furniture, gold bed, gold sheets, and a gold bathroom. The blueprint for dictator excess. There was an indoor pool, too. Because dictators need to swim inside.

QOTD from Gru: {talking about the East German Trabant car, which was the most popular car in Romania during the 80s} “It was an absolute piece of shit, but as far as communist design goes, it was pretty good.”

Freedom Square

Next is Freedom Square (every Eastern European city seems to have one), the site of the violent December 1989 revolution that brought down Ceaușescu. I actually remember watching it unfold live on the news when I was in college. Ceaușescu delivered a speech from the balcony of the Central Committee building (shown in the photos below), but the situation quickly spiraled out of control. The next day, the Ceaușescus fled by helicopter as crowds stormed party headquarters. They were captured about 50 kilometers away in Târgoviște. Five days later, Ceaușescu and his wife were tried, convicted, and executed by firing squad.

I said it before, but I’ll say it again: people don’t like a dictator.

Palace of the Parliament

This is the Palace of the Parliament, often described as Stalinist wedding cake architecture – for obvious reasons. Built by Ceaușescu largely as a vanity project, it came at an enormous cost to both the city and its people. Entire neighborhoods were bulldozed to make way for it, erasing historic streets and churches to create space for this oversized symbol of dictatorship. It remains one of the largest buildings in the world: a massive marble monster that practically screams, look at me. Even today, around 70% of it sits unused, while its heating, electricity, and lighting alone cost more than $6 million a year.

Sidebar: Bucharest traffic is horrendous. We spent more time sitting in traffic on the herd bus than we did walking around.

Speaking of enormous structures, our hotel for the night has a pretty swell view. That’s the People’s Salvation Cathedral (aka the National Cathedral) in front of the Palace of Excess. It’s the largest Orthodox church in the world. But we’ll have to investigate that tomorrow.

Noroc (cheers)!

Travel date: October 22, 2025.