Kimkim Trip Reviews for Romania

Our 15 day, self-drive tour of Romania was exceptional! Raluca and her team put together a terrific itinerary which brought us to a wide range of scenic, historic, urban and rural sights. In addition to the ‘must-see’ stops and historic town centers, the itinerary provided the opportunity to visit a variety of unique, out-of -the-way places like former monasteries, wooden and fortified churches, and castles and fortresses, all in varying states of repair. There were also great country drives through farms and pasture land and some truly impressive rides through the mountains. Don’t miss the Transfargarasan mountain road to Balea Lac!
We stayed in a mix of city hotels and country pensiuneas. These rural B&B ’s were all different. Most were unique. All were good.
We drove 1300 miles in 15 days. We were surprised and awed by the scenery. We saw an agrarian and pastoral life that will likely disappear in the next 25 years. We learned about the history and culture of a people of which we knew relatively little.
If you are travelers who are comfortable on your own, like to discover new places and learn the ‘what and why’ of its people, we highly recommend this trip to you.

Cristi was amazing...very knowledgeable and helpful and just good company.
I loved the time I spent over at the Black Sea...hotel wasn't the best. My room was near the lobbly and the elevator so it was kind of noisy.
Bucharest is an amazing city. I enjoyed all my time spent there.
The Equus Silvania was great. Food, people, lodging and horses were all great. Didn't get to ride as much as I thought I would though.
Guesthouse Daniela was not the best. Food, and Lodging were not good.
Boat ride on the Danube and Bigar falls were fantastic
Hike up to Poenari Fortress was great!
I loved the city of Brasov.
Overall...a great and memorable experience.

Thank you all,
Sandy

We could not be happier with our experience with KimKim and Romania Activ. Raluca created an excellent itinerary for us, taking into account our peculiar habit of travelling by train as much as possible!

All the accommodation she booked was comfortable, clean, and ideally located to see the sights in the cities we visited. Particularly memorable was our stay with Georges Iurca in Botiza, a wonderful and knowledgeable host in a beautiful village.

Had a great time, Silviu was very helpful and kept in touch with our progress, he was very professional. We will recommend you and Silviu. Thanks again. Steve, and rest of group.

Raluca was fantastic! She met us at the hotel and made sure we understood the route and itinerary as well as arranged for car pick up at the hotel. She was also easily contactable the we wanted to make some minor adjustments to the program we had arranged. Would highly recommend her as a tour organiser.
We mainly stayed in a B&B in a small village in the Carpathian Alps (Maluga). The hosts were friendly, helpful and efficient with ample breakfast and dinner provided as well as opportunity to make sandwiches for treks into the mountains. Room was comfortable, clean with en suite.
Carpathian Alps have well marked, long walking tracks with views comparable to Austria or Switzerland. Guidebook provided was accurate with good directional assistance.
Also stayed in Brasov. Accomodation was in an Austrian styled villa hotel walking distance from old town with nice views of Black church and the hills behind the city from the balcony. Brasov also had a very pretty old town if maybe already a bit touristy. There are also skiing resorts in the mountains 30 min from Brasov with walking, cycling tracks etc.
Bram castle was a chaotic place with too many tourists and buses and probably worth avoiding in June / July. Krasnov citadel was easier to access and more interesting.
Dont expect to get anywhere quickly by road in summer. Lots of traffic jams, around towns and road works. Alpine roads are likely to be dirt or gravel a lot of the time - so drive carefully!
Prices were very reasonable everywhere in Lei. With the arrival of the Euro and more tourists Romania will more than likely become as unreasonably expensive as the rest of Europe. So, get there before more of the regular tourists discover it.

The best part of the trip was Magura - a magical village in the mountains. We were lucky in that the rain stopped while we did the planned hike- but it could have otherwise meant 2 days in a small place being cold and wet. The hike was very challenging- about 6 hours ( not 4 hours as written). We did it, but I would suggest doing it with a guide or small group. The food and staff at the lodge were warm and friendly- even through the language barrier.
The car was dependable,and the driver was punctual and drove us to the airport. It would have been good to be picked up after our midnight flight as we missed the transfer bus and had to wait an hour for the 2 km trip to the RIN hotel. An all wheel drive would be more suited to the country roads. The RIN hotel staff was helpful, letting us leave our bags and then giving us a room to change on the way back from the trip.
We only had 3 days, so we devised our route after Magura via Rasnov fortress and then continuing over the mountain into Brasnov. Bran and Peles Castle were full of tour buses, so hard to enjoy these visits.
I would suggest going to a city first to get used to the language, roads etc and then to Magura.
We saw a lot in the 4 night stay- thank you!

I was a little skeptical initially about using Kim kim to assist w my travel planning as I had never heard of them and the 2 local travel agents that I know had not heard of them either. My family decided that Romania would be an interesting place to visit, but our local travel agents knew nothing about it and I was at a loss when attempting to plan the trip myself, using travel guide books etc.

I found Kim Kim while doing internet searches about travel planning for Romania. Kim kim connected me to a local travel guide, Raluca Teodor who was very helpful and responsive. Kim kim also was extremely helpful and responsive when I contacted them initially, they returned my calls and answered my questions about how their service worked immediately and then followed up with emails to be sure that all my questions were answered. I felt reassured that they were a legitimate company and I could feel secure in using their service to plan our vacation for our family, which ended up including 5 adults ranging in age from 25-70.

Raluca assisted me in planning every step of our trip including hotel transfers, itinerary, hotel and guest house bookings and suggestions for activities. The planning was made more difficult as everyone had different travel schedules and to make it back to Bucharest to go home at different intervals during the trip. Every hotel or guest house booked was clean, in a nice location and included a free, very nice breakfast. The guest houses provided home cooked dinners as well, preparing local specialties and some of them even provided picnic lunches. Romania is a beautiful country with many of the same attractions of other European destinations, including several Unesco designated sites, but at about 1/3 the price. We found many english speakers, especially among the younger people, though not as much as other European countries, we had wi fi in most of our accommodations. It was great to stay in the guest houses with the local people and learn some of their customs.

We enjoyed Transylvania which is beautiful and maybe the most populated area in Romania, but we also loved Bucovina for the painted monasteries and Maramures for the wooden churches and observing how the local people still dress in their traditional clothing, work in the fields daily and use horses and carts to transport hay and other products of their daily work. Romania is a great combination of old world charm with modern conveniences in most places. It was a great experience and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to go somewhere a little off the grid but without too much roughing it.

We met Raluca after the visit and gave feedback. Overall the trip was exactly what we asked for. We are pleased.
Every host did well albeit very differently from UK! To UK travellers I'd say it's like France in the 80's; no facilities for making hot drinks in your room except at hotels, and take bags of tea with you with travel kettle! After meals that you bought as part of the trip, you still have to pay for coffee as extra. Learn some Romanian - you'll need it. Driving there isn't hard if you're calm, but country roads can be unmetalled and deep potholes make for slow progress. Host-provided picnics can be clumsy chunks - and remember always you provide your own drink. Watch out for impulse stops; we were scammed by nuns! Do not use any yellow car at airport. I made a mistake and thought I would solve it using one and was overcharged and dumped away from target. If you use Bogdan in the Delta, rest assured he is an excellent boatman. He also speaks English excellently but don't expect him to be a nature guide too. We wanted to be self guiding and are happy, but for some people I'd suggest considering hiring guides for the mountain walks.

Accomodation all good.

My only one thing is that our itinerary had has going to the bear sanctuary on a Monday but it is closed on a Monday. Thankfully we worked this out in advance by looking at out Lonely Planet book and looking at their website on line so we could plan ahead and alter our itinerary. It would have been very frustrating to get all the way there and realise it was not open and miss it all together as it was one of the highlights of the trip.

Raluca made our trip very enjoyable. She organized car rental, all accommodations and an itenerary which was interesting and easy to follow with places of interest etc