I’ve decided to write this post in English because I am hopping the information below might be of good use to anyone vising Bucharest:).
One Sunday afternoon I thought to myself it would be interesting experience to see Bucharest through the eyes of a tourist; and what better way to get to know a city faster than taking the city’s tour bus :)?
After doing a little bit of research over the Internet (regarding prices, bus stops etc) I took my camera and prepared myself for seeing the city from the second storey of a double-decker :).
I took the bus from University Square (bus stop 9; see map below) and did the full tour (got off at Unirea Square which is bus stop 8).
Bucharest City Tour Map
The first thing I found a little bit annoying was the fact that there were no maps or schedule in the bus station.
The only piece of information I found regarding the bus schedule was over the internet and was pretty vague: “Daily departures approx. every 15 minutes”. The thing is that I waited almost 30 min for the tour bus which was pretty disappointing being a weekend day.
After getting in the bus, unfortunately I was to be disappointed again: for Romanian speakers no audio guide or map was offered when getting in the bus.
I had to ask for the audio guide and map to be given to me; I am not sure why but it seemed that the ticket seller was under the impression that Romanian speakers should know the city by heart and don’t need any additional information.
I was pretty disappointed also by the explanations provided by the audio guide in English:
-the explanations were not synchronized with the actual landmarks; as I realize that a slight lack of synchronization can happen due to the traffic conditions the explanations are absolutely useless if one receives them 5 min before arriving to that specific place.
-the bus stations were announced in Romanian although the rest of the explanations were in English 🙂
-most of the time nothing was to be herd in the head phones; that’s too bad because there are more than a few interesting thing that are not even mentioned in the audio guide.
Music might also be very nice on the background of the audio explanations; I saw something similar in Salzburg : Mozart’s music was the background for the audio explanations and for enjoying the city.
I am not sure why the ministry of tourism did not follow that example and put Enescu’s music (a world famous Romanian composer) at background; it would have made the tour more enjoyable.
There are a couple of other things that I did not like:
-there was no map in English (only in Romanian) which made it pretty useless for people not speaking Romanian (for most tourists that is 🙂 )
-on the map in Romanian there was not enough information regarding the sights marked on the map; only some names were mentioned. There was nothing regarding the visiting hours or what was interesting to see there
-some of the bus stops weren’t located just in front/next to the attraction points; some of the sights were actually pretty far and hard to spot from the bus station and no indicators were in place to guide the tourists.
One more complain and I am done 🙂 : it’s a pity that the tour does not cover also the area surrounding Bucharest because I can think of at least one thing worth visiting: Mogosoaia Palace.
To end the post in a happy note I must tell you that if you’ve seen a palace-like building (is located somewhere between the 11th and the 12th stop) with some golden lions in front and was wondering what’s with it 🙂 here is the answer: that’s the house of a controversial football club owner 🙂 .
To any foreign tourists reading this:
-please take into account that the touristic bus line was introduces only last year 🙂
-I plan to write a letter to the Ministry Of Tourism and I hope things will improve 🙂
-if you’re planning a visit and have any questions drop me a comment and I’ll try to help you with the information you need 🙂
Date of Tour: 23rd of September 2012
Official site: http://bucharestcitytour.ratb.ro/index_eng.html
Romanian Travelling Chick 