Experience the best of Sighișoara

Sighișoara's citadel was built on a hill by Saxon settlers in the twelfth century and is one of the few inhabited medieval fortified towns in Europe, listed by UNESCO. Nine of the original fourteen guild towers survive, and the 64-metre Clock Tower, with its museum, is the symbol of the town. A covered wooden staircase, the Scholars' Stair, climbs to the church on the hill, and its cemetery has views over the roofs.

The house where the father of Vlad the Impaler lived in the 1430s, said to be the birthplace of Vlad himself, stands near the main square. The countryside around holds a number of fortified Saxon churches, including Biertan and Viscri, both listed by UNESCO. Brașov and the Carpathian foothills are within a couple of hours' drive to the south-east.

In the lanes of the citadel, stews, cabbage rolls and polenta with sour cream and cheese are on most menus. Every July the old town stages a medieval festival with costumed processions. Summer evenings on the cobbled lanes are warm, and the citadel looks its best in the soft light of early autumn.