Might not be the everyones first choice as a travel destination, but it still has amazing and interesting sights. Especially the wine tour, which was my personal highlight of this country. The poorest country in Europe and in many ways pretty untouched. Not the unusual destination for a typical European tourist. Moldova is working towards a real democracy and the standard of living in Europe.
We arrived in Chisinau via Bus from Odessa, which was a sketchy ride in a small bus with only locals. Luckily a friendly local woman helped us to find our way to the hostel and walked with us to the bus station. You pay only in cash in the bus. A ticket costed around 15$, so pretty cheap =) You pay the bus driver when you get off the bus and passengers, who sit in the back just hand forward the cash to the bus driver. Exchange will get passed back. First, we were so confused haha. But the people are all very honest and we didn’t see any single person, who just left without paying.
We slept in the Tapok Hostel, which is located pretty close to the city center and you can reach everything by foot. They provide you with city maps, give useful tips and the employees are super nice 🙂 Chisinau didn’t offer any free walking tours, so we explored the city by ourselves. You can see everything in half a day, since the city itself is very small with only one main street.
Highlight was definitely the day trip to the winery Cricova. Its its second largest wine cellar in the WORLD! Did you know that? I didn’t. So obviously we had to go there haha 🙂
Some facts about Cricova:
↠ It has about 120km underground tunnels and wine storage. It is like an underground city where you get around via a small train.
↠ Apparently during the Nazi occupation Jewish people were hidden in these tunnels and in wine barrels.
↠ Kazakhstan is the biggest importer of the Cricova wines.
↠ Russians president Vladimir Putin has his 50th birthday at the winery and many more celebrities visited the winery.
PLACES TO SEE
» City center (half day tour) – everything is easily walkable, just organize yourself a city map 🙂
» Public Market
» Cricova Winery (Book a tour ahead online)» P
It's me JULIA 
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