Bucharest City Highlights Guided Walking Tour

The Old Princely Court and the old town

The old town of Bucharest grew around the Old Princely Court, the residence of the princes of Wallachia from the fifteenth century. A document issued here in 1459 contains the first written mention of the city's name. Today you see the brick ruins of the palace, its vaulted cellars and the small Old Court Church, the oldest surviving church in Bucharest, built in the sixteenth century.

Around the court spreads the Lipscani quarter, named after the merchants who traded goods from Leipzig. Its narrow streets are lined with restored merchant houses, arcades and cafés, and it is where most visitors begin a Bucharest old town tour. Your guide explains how this compact quarter was the commercial heart of the city for centuries, and how it survived fires, earthquakes and the demolitions of the 1980s.

Manuc's Inn, a historic caravanserai

Built in 1808 by an Armenian merchant, Manuc's Inn is the best-preserved caravanserai in Bucharest. Traders arrived with their carts in the large inner courtyard, stored goods in the cellars, sold them in the ground-floor shops and slept in the rooms above, reached by long wooden galleries. In 1812 the inn hosted the talks that led to the Treaty of Bucharest between the Russian and Ottoman empires.

The building still welcomes guests and diners, and its courtyard is one of the most photographed corners of the city. The guided stop lasts about 20 minutes, enough to step inside the courtyard and picture the busy trading life of the early nineteenth century, when inns like this were the meeting places of merchants from across the Balkans and the Levant.

Stavropoleos Monastery

Hidden in a quiet lane of the old town, Stavropoleos Monastery was founded in 1724 by a Greek monk. Its church is small, but every surface is decorated: a portico of slender stone columns with carved floral arches, painted saints on the outer walls and an interior glowing with frescoes and a gilded wooden iconostasis. The style blends Byzantine tradition with late Renaissance ornament, typical of Wallachia at that time.

The quiet courtyard is lined with old carved tombstones, and the monastery keeps an important collection of Byzantine music manuscripts and a choir known for its chant. Entry is free, but visitors are asked to dress modestly and keep their voices low. It is one of the oldest and best-preserved monasteries in the city, and a favourite stop of every guided walk in Bucharest.

Calea Victoriei and Revolution Square

Calea Victoriei is Bucharest's oldest and most elegant avenue. It was first paved with oak beams in 1692 and took its present name after Romania's victory in the war of independence in 1878. Walking along it you pass the National Military Circle, the art deco Telephone Palace of 1933, once the tallest building in the city, and the grand banks of the former financial district.

The avenue opens into Revolution Square, where the former Royal Palace now holds the National Museum of Art and the domed Romanian Athenaeum, a concert hall opened in 1888, stands across the gardens. In December 1989 crowds gathered here to bring down the communist regime, and a white marble memorial recalls the victims. A Calea Victoriei walk is the best way to see how the city changed from princely town to modern capital.

Cismigiu Gardens and Bucharest City Hall

Cismigiu Gardens is the oldest public park in Bucharest, laid out in the mid-nineteenth century on the site of a marshy lake. Its name recalls the official who looked after the city's fountains and once lived here. Shady paths wind around a lake with rowing boats in summer and a skating rink in winter, past old trees, bridges and a circle of busts of Romanian writers.

The walk through the gardens is a welcome pause after the busy avenue, and locals come here to play chess, read and feed the ducks. At the southern edge stands Bucharest City Hall, built in the early twentieth century in the Neo-Romanian style. In spring and autumn the colours of the park make it one of the most beautiful stops on the route.

Union Boulevard and the Palace of the Parliament

The last part of the walk enters the Civic Centre, the district rebuilt in the 1980s after a large part of the old city was demolished. Union Boulevard was designed to be longer and wider than the most famous avenues of Western Europe, with fountains along its centre and identical apartment blocks on both sides. It leads straight to the Palace of the Parliament.

Begun in 1984, the palace is one of the largest administrative buildings in the world and is often called the heaviest. On this tour you see it from outside while your guide tells the story of its construction. Is the Palace of the Parliament worth visiting inside? Yes, but interior visits are by separate guided tour only, with a passport or ID, and are not part of this walk.