The trip to Bucharest was totally unplanned. I spend every summer in my favorite place, a small Bulgarian town of Byala, and use it as an opportunity to visit the Russian consulate in Varna to do some paperwork. This is a lot cheaper and less time consuming than to fly from Denver to Houston. Last summer, the consulate in Varna was closed, temporarily, but as we all know nothing is more permanent than temporary.
One option was to travel to Sofia which is 6 to 8 hours by train or bus. I was in Sofia several times by now and in my opinion, Sofia is the most boring city in Bulgaria. The consulate in Bucharest, Romania, was closer to me than Sofia. Besides, I never visited Bucharest before.
It takes 4 hours for a Flixbus bus to get from Varna to Bucharest. The only stop is at the border. Although both countries, Bulgaria and Romania, are EU members and this year, they became members of the Schengen, passport control still exist at land borders.
We arrived in Bucharest after 10 p.m. I rushed to the metro that closes at 11 p.m., got to the city center and walked to my hotel. The temperature was +31⁰ C (88⁰ F) at almost midnight. The streets were crowded – the locals were getting fresh air. They walked their dogs or drank beer outside. Even shops were still open.
Next morning, I went to the consulate where a helpful employee promptly did all my paperwork. It was a big contrast with the vice-consul in Varna whom I met on more than one occasion. He did not strike me as a warm and welcoming person. Security guards in Varna made everyone to go through a metal detector, they checked bags, took away cell phones and locked them up for the duration of the visit. There was no security in Bucharest except for a post of the Romanian police outside of the consulate, nobody searched my purse. It was easy to get in, I just needed to make an appointment.
Mission accomplished, and I had the rest of the day for myself. The temperature reached +39⁰ C (102⁰ F). I moved by dashes from one shade to another and got to the mansion where the leader of the Romanian Communist Party, Nicolae Ceaușescu, lived with his family. His house is now a museum. It was very much worth visiting, there will be a separate post about the museum.
I returned to my air-conditioned hotel room after a meal and for a couple of hours just lay flat to regain strength. When I felt recovered enough, I took a walk around. The brick and stone buildings absorbed heat during the day. They were releasing it into air as the sun was going down. It felt like walking in a sauna. The old part of Bucharest is quite pretty. It would have been a lot prettier without graffiti everywhere, even on historic buildings.
