Chisinau could use some sprucing up. In fact, when my bus crossed the border from Romania into Moldova the roads instantly became bumpier. As we bumped along the road to Chisinau we passed other road users such as cars, and trucks, and horse carts. Dilapidated could be one word to describe the city. The sidewalks are cracked, uneven, decaying, you always need to watch your step.

And yet it’s quite nice here. People are friendly, there’s some things to see, some lovely parks. I wandered the city, taking in the atmosphere that is very pleasant despite the disrepair of the streets. And of course the interior of shops and restaurants is modern and clean and nothing like the exterior. In the centre there is a massive indoor and outdoor market, where you can buy everything from cheese and fish to clothes to bed sheets, and the amount of produce for sale was a breath of fresh air after the sad selections in many grocery stores I’ve been in recently.

I visited the National Museum of Ethnography and Natural History, a ticket for which costs less than one dollar. I think it would have been a top notch museum maybe 30 years ago, and it’s still quite good, but not very modern. They have a huge collection of taxidermised animals, and fossils, and info about the geography of Moldova, as well as the history of people in the area from the stone age till the present day. I probably would have learned a lot if there had been any info in English. It didn’t help that since I arrived with only 45 minutes till closing there was a strange old man shooing all the visitors to follow the same route and hurry up so that he could turn off the lights in each section after us. But as I said earlier, $1.

I was very happy to find a bar serving Moldovan craft beer. It was surprising to find, and even more surprising that there was quite a good selection of quality beers. Moldova is known for their wine, so I certainly didn’t expect a menu of 20 different beers from 4 local breweries.

A highlight of my time in Chisinau was exploring an abandoned observatory. Right next to the main road and the University of Medicine is a building with all its exterior walls removed. Upon climbing to the top floor there is a tower leading into the dome of an old observatory. The building is covered in graffiti and piled full of trash, and it made for a fun bit of exploration.

Well, that’s about all I have to say about the least visited country in Europe. Join me next time for an even less visited country in Europe.

Here be photos.