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Customer's Opinions about guide from Bucharest, Romania
One of the best tours we ever had in many years. Romania was a great surprise. Toured last Fall and are returning for a second/alternative tour of Romania this coming Spring.
Andrei Nicolau Miclea worked with our group of 15 travelers to Romania. He put a package together for Transylvania that was wonderful!! He was easy to work with and he tailored the program to our specifications. He lined us up with a GREAT tour director, George Buliga, who we all LOVED. We all had the BEST time in Transylvania!
Its taken me a while but i would like to thank Andrei and his team for a fantastic tour, we only did the short 6 days but the sites, people and country were one of the best trips i have ever had.
Our guide Emil? was so knowledgeable and passionate about his country that it really made us feel part of the experience and not just a tour.
I would highly recommend a trip to Romaina and definitely the use of Andrei and his team to do it.
We could not have had a better tour! Andrei planned a wonderful two day tour that was the highlight of our 12 day cruise through the Black Sea. We stayed busy the entire time, had the opportunity to try traditional Romanian food, and saw spectacular sights from the Peles Castle to the Palace of Parliament and the Village Museum as well as the streets of Bucharest.
We feel planning private tours offer a much better experience and value than taking tours arranged by the cruise lines which often become the equivalent of herding cats trying to satisfy 50 people on a bus. We see more in less time and it always more enjoyable.
Our tour was just wonderful. Andrei sent one of his associates which we knew in advance and we could not have asked for a better tour. We will not hesitate to recommend his services.
The best with Nicolau is that he knows the country so well he can put together and run any type tour you'd want. He is not a tour broker, his tours and not replicated after other tour companies but he creates his own itineraries. We were fortunate to be part of one of his small groups in the fall of 2011 on one of the best cultural immersion tour we took in years, probably comparable to our tour of Israel back in 1999.
Nicolau is a member of the National Geographic Society and has run tours for A&K and various tour companies in both Romania and abroad. We highly recommend Nicolau for the ability of revealing Romania the way it actually is with good and bad.
Excellent travel designer. His tours are a step above anything else on the market. Our tour of Romania on his itinerary was one of the best we ever took.
We would like to thank you for arranging our recent land tour of Romania. It is a beautiful country with a lot of history and culture. Of all the countries we have visited in Europe, Romania is our favorite. We greatly appreciated our tour guide, Ioana Stoenesceu and our driver, Tudoran Christian-ionot, interesting sharing of the culture and sights of the areas. We were amazed and entranced with everything they shared with us and everything we saw. We would love to return and see more of the country. We will highly recommend your company to our fellow travelers. Thanks you again for arranging and customizing this trip for us.
Hi - You're quite right about how much we really enjoyed our trip. In terms of our guide, he was fantastic. Very, very accommodating and knowledgeable. He knew when to get us to certain places so that we didn't miss seeing things. At the same time he certainly gave me a plenty of time to take pictures without being rushed. In fact, he was able to give me some good suggestions in terms of places, etc. All in all, I'd highly recommend you to anyone else wanting a guide in Romania. Thank you for the wonderful adventure you planned for us.
"We started in Romania and spent 6 days traveling around the country. We arrived in Bucharest early evening, stayed one night at the Hilton and got a good night's sleep. That did the trick as we were ready to go early the next morning. We arranged for a driver guide to take us throughout the country as we didn't want to hassle with trying to drive ourselves. Based on the advice from several Fodorites, we worked with Andrei Nicolau Miclea in Bucharest and he was fantastic - easy to work with, very responsive and very reasonable.
Before heading out of town, our guide took us on a city tour of Bucharest. We were surprised by the amazing architecture, especially in the older sections of the city. We went on a tour of Ceausescu's Palace which was not finished before his death. It is a huge building that is now the Senate and Administrative building.
We then headed out of town to get to Sinaia before late afternoon so that we could tour Peles Palace. The landscape was beautiful as was the Palace. There was a new hotel, International Hotel, where we stayed and it was quite nice. On our way back to our hotel we stopped at Orthodox Monastery that was very interesting. It was the first Orthodox Monastery we visited.
The next day we visited several places in Transylvania. Our first stop was the Bran (Dracula's) Castle. It was fun and interesting actually seeing and touring a structure that has so much lore attached to it. Our guide gave us an official "lecture" on the folklore associated with Dracula along with the truths.
We saw many horse carts through the country, but especially in this area. Next stop was Brasov where we saw the old town that had houses in the German style and the Black Church that has a large collection of Persian rugs. We ended the day in Sighisoara, which is a world heritage site due to the upper town medieval citadel.
We spent two nights in the upper town and thoroughly enjoyed it. It was enjoyable to just sit around the square and enjoy the sights around us. The area was very manageable to walk around. This was one of our favorite spots. One evening, we ate dinner at Dracula's birth place. And, of course, we felt that it was only fitting to have a glass of "Vampire" wine while in Transylvania!
The next day we toured the area and stopped to photograph a gypsy market where they were selling/trading pigs and horses. It was fascinating. Most were in horse carts with wagons for the pigs, etc., but one of the most interesting sites was a Mercedes pulling a cart filled with pigs.
We also visited some interesting churches and towns in the area. I really enjoyed just driving through the country away from the main roads to see farmers using horses and wooden plows to till the soil.
The next day we headed to the northeastern part of the country to an area where they have painted Monasteries. I'd never seen anything like this. There are as many frescoes painted on the outside of the churches as the inside. It was amazing. We stayed at a new Best Western Hotel in this area which was quite nice and comfortable.
On our final day of touring we headed back to Bucharest for a farewell dinner and cultural performance. We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Romania and were surprised at the many sites that we were not expecting. We covered a lot of ground in 6 days and were grateful that we didn't have to do any of the driving. I'm not a very adventurous eater, but I was always able to find something I liked. The salads were amazing. The lettuce/tomatoes tasted like it has just been picked in the garden.
There were times when we just wanted a quick sandwich for lunch. We found that there were many gas stations that had "fast food" restaurants which served pre-made sandwiches which really hit the spot. We much preferred this to sitting in a restaurant for an hour or more.
We flew to Krakow the next morning. I'll continue more later. If you have any questions, let me know and I'll try to answer them.
Nancy Allen & sister
The tour was above expectations. Extremely knowledgeable tour guide able to answer all our questions. Had a fantastic time in Transylvania and the Danube Delta. We highly recommend Andrei.
Hi Andrei -
I just wanted to thank you again for making our trip to Romania a memorable one. My husband and I had a wonderful vacation, thanks to you!!! Everything you planned out for us was perfect!
I will definitely recommend you to anyone I know who is planning a trip to Romania. I am also going to stop by the Romanian Tourist Bureau here in London and tell them how great your services were and that they should include you on their list of recommended tour guides!
Thanks again,
Laurie Corson
I liked Romania very much! Too much. Excursions are perfect. Transylvania - splendidly, Maramures - very beautiful, Bran - interestingly. Every city is so well in his own way! Organization of our tour - well. There was nothing wrong. Thank you Andrei Nicolau Miclea
My wife and I have just returned from Romania. We toured for 11 days with our private guide Andrei Nicolau Miclea. He was recommended by the International Travel News magazine and a few travelers to Romania - both on this web site and on similar ones. We then saw him interviewing on the television last fall on the Travel Channel. We would like to commend Andrei for his superior knowledge of English, patience, charm and above all, the ability of customizing the tour according to our special interests. The fact he knows Romania so well was such an advantage. Meeting locals in their homes and learning about their lives, attending a folklore show organized for us only as well as touring some of the off the beaten track sites - were all rewarding experiences. We particularly liked the friendliness of the Maramures family we stayed with for two days. We never thought Romania to be such a beautiful and fascinating land with a diversity of culture and customs. And it is now changing fast - in fact we found the country much more developed than we ever thought. We would like to return to the area - probably visiting Bulgaria and Albania in 09. Martin & Jen Richards New York, NY
Actually I liked the rest in Romania, I have a lot of impressions, our guide Andrei was excellent. Tour is well organized, visited many cities, saw a lot of sights - very interesting and informative.