SISTEM Rocks Sibiu...

Walking across Piata Mare we heard the opening chords to AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long" accompanied by incredibly loud drumming, so naturally we had to stay and have a listen...

The noise was coming from Romanian band SISTEM:

All members of SISTEM are classically trained musicians and they utilise a wide variety of objects as instruments (beer kegs, steel drums, plastic barrels, bags, coffee cups and lanterns) and they also use fire!

Their live show is very energetic and they drum to a wide range of music.

Highlight of the evening was their rendition of "Funky Town".

I'm now the proud owner of their most recent CD SisTeMpo...a fantastic souvenir to remind me of my time in Romania!

Catedrala Ortodoxa:

Biserica Evanghelica:

Buildings...

Ornate building in Piata Mare:

Amazing front door:

Random old building:

Intricate tiled roof:

Laundry and rooftop eyes:

Views from Turnul Sfatului:

Climbing to the top of Turnul Sfatului (Council Tower) allows excellent views of:

Piata Mare:

Lower Town:

Roman Catholic Cathedral:

And the tiled roof of the Evangelical Church:

Serendipitous Discoveries...

On the way back from Cisnadioara we stumbled across this:

In the top left hand corner you can see the blue, red and yellow stripe of the Romanian flag:

At the fruit and vege market this lovely old lady offered us some fresh herbs:

How delectable does this produce look?

On Romanian menus there are generally three salads on offer. Tomato salad which consists of chopped tomatoes with no dressing, Cucumber salad which consists of chopped cucumbers with no dressing and Mixed salad which consists of - you guessed it - chopped tomatoes and cucumbers with no dressing.

At least the tomatoes and cucumbers are incredibly fresh!

Adventures in Cisnadioara...

We were up bright and early to rent mountain bikes from Casa Luxemburg but first we had to find some breakfast...after a fruitless search for 30 minutes - all the open cafes only served coffee, no food - we found a greasy fast food shop that sold hot dogs and fried bread. Suitably fueled we started off on our bouncy (no suspension + Romanian roads = very sore butts) 10km ride to the tiny village of Cisnadioara passing the Museum of Traditional Folk Civilisation on the way. After climbing some deadly hills we arrived at the Baroque church in the centre of Cisnadioara and parked our bikes behind this haystack.

This well is located behind the church and is a reliable source of water for the town's residents:

This charming old man kindly explained to me in Romanian how to get water out of the well and told me that he had been drawing water from here daily for the last 60 years. I think he also told me the secret of eternal youth - but unfortunately my Romanian was too rudimentary to grasp it:

The Baroque church dating from 1764 has the western tower of an even older Gothic church attached:

A little Hobbit door dating from 1917:

It was a relief to coast down the hills on the way back to Sibiu!

First shots of Sibiu...