Page 23 - 2007 AMA Summer

xercise Vampire Dragon Later that morning there were Ewas a 9 day expedition I several administrative tasks to organised to take 15 per­ be carried out over that sonnel from HQ 1 Mech Bde itnocluded, changing all our Romania. The aims of thmeoney, purchasing train tick- expedition were fourfold; etots, finding out about the left visit Dracula’s Castle, to sumlu­ggage at the railway station, mit Romania’s highepsturchasing petrol for the Mountain, Mount Moldoveanus,toves and rations for the to get some of the group theixrpedition. The remainder of Summer Mountain Proficiencthye group also flew out - late
award and to foster a spirit doufe to work commitments. adventure, self reliance and
leadership within the headIn­ order that we achieved our
climax when compared with the creepy image of the novel,
There was no escaping the fact we were going to have to walk so we hired a bus to take us and all our kit to the start point. This was in the forest at the base of the Fagaras Ridge that would take us through the Transylvanian Alps. We
had been talking to people on
our journey and had been warned of the bears and wolves we would encounter on our expedition. Not sure if our leg was being pulled or not, our first task remained to cut some stout poles and sharpen them at one end - thus our Bear Fighting Poles (BFPs) were created. Along with all the garlic, crucifixes and holy water we felt invinci- ble and ready to face the worst beasties Romania could throw at us.
The first days walk took us up out of the forest and onto the ridge where we set up camp, It was here that we encoun-
quarter staff.
We flew British Airways - care­ fully selected not because they offered free booze on the flight out (and back) but because they had the greatest flexibility. We flew into Bucharest arriving just before midnight and once we had established ourselves in our hostel thought it rude not to check out something of the capital. Unfortunately, the only places that were open were bars and clubs, but we still managed to see a few inter­ esting sights.
first aim of visiting 'Dracula's Castle' we headed off by train to the village of Bran. The link between Bran Castle and Dracula is fairly tenuous. The myth of Vampires was not invented by Bram Stoker. He wrote a vampire novel called 'Dracula'and set it originally in France but later moved the setting to Transylvania. It is wrongly assumed that hie based his novel on Vlad ‘The Impailer' Tepes. Vlad may have visited the castle but Bram Stoker certainly didnlt. The castle is interesting but the group found it a big anti-