“I like to use local transport, travel the back roads,” I had said to my husband’s friend Eric, whom we accompanied on a trip to Eastern Europe earlier this month. “I’ve met some of the nicest people on public transport. It’s the best way to meet locals.”

My hearty endorsement of anything that wasn’t a plane was the main reason that we didn’t book flights to get us from Romania to Turkey. Instead, we set out one morning by rail from Brasov, about 100 miles north of Bucharest, and used two connecting trains to get us to Varna, a Black Sea resort town in Bulgaria. We decided to stay two nights in Varna before continuing on to Istanbul by bus. The idea looked good on paper, at least.Continue Reading