Headed to Piata Unirii on the metro, then walked down Str Unirii to the Palace of Parliament, Romania's most famous building. A communist dictator demolished 1/6 of the city to build the Palace and Str Unirii - both monstrousities. Str Unirii was meant to be like the Champs Elysees...but is nothing like it. From there we headed back to the square and went into a shopping centre - it was pretty grim. Some old woman grabbed my arm and started asking for money, scar...

We decided to travel first-class to Bucharest - a wise move since we got a lovely air-conditioned carriage, all for an extra pound! We got a taxi from the station to the hotel 'Floreta de Aur'...and were slightly ripped off...The hotel was nice and by some strange coincidence it was run by the Romanian Fencing Federation. We headed for the centre of the city by metro - not that the city really has a centre though, it's pretty sprawling and everything is spread ou...