How fit do I need to be?

Fit enough for back-to-back days in the saddle. If you’ve never done that, take the short route.

How do I get to Sibiu?

By air, road or rail. Sibiu has an international airport with direct flights from several European cities, and Romania has been in Schengen since January 2025.

Transylvania Trail — Self-supported bikepacking event through timeless Transylvanian landscapes

Gravel is not a surface. It’s not knowing what comes next.

Tarmac. Trail. And everything in between. [tarmac, concrete slabs, crushed stone, meadow, grass track, forest road, roots, river bank, wooden bridge, dirt double track, tractor ruts, village cobbles, singletrack, sand, water crossing, hike-a-bike, trail]Gravel rig or hardtail. Bring one bike and ride the lot.

Crushed stone on the Transylvania Trail route — **Crushed stone.** Compacted stone laid for carts and kept in good order. Fast and sure-footed whether it’s dry or wet. The kilometres you’ll remember as effortless.

Six bikepackers grinning on a hilltop meadow, loaded bikes in the grass and forested hills behind — **Meadow.** Hay meadow crossed by a line worn in by sheep and tractors. Slow, soft, and full of the smell of cut grass in June.

A bikepacker riding a gravel doubletrack through a tunnel of green forest — **Forest road.** Kilometres of logging track through some of the oldest woodland left in Europe. Cool, quiet, and worth timing so you’re out of the trees before dark.

River bank on the Transylvania Trail route — **River bank.** Crushed-stone dyke tracks that run along both banks of the river. Flat, fast and steady, with water beside you and the next village somewhere ahead.

Singletrack on the Transylvania Trail route — **Singletrack.** Narrow trail winding through the forest. Flowing, not technical, and some of the most enjoyable riding of your week. Easy enough on a gravel bike, a joy on a hardtail.

Smooth tarmac on the Transylvania Trail route — **Smooth tarmac.** Yes, tarmac. About half the route, on quiet county roads. Some of it is easy rolling between the gravel sections; some of it is the smooth sub-alpine climbing that earns you the biggest views of the week.

Village cobbles on the Transylvania Trail route — **Village cobbles.** River stones set by hand a century or more ago, and still the main street in some of the Saxon villages on the route. Slow, loud, and the most photogenic hundred metres of your day.

Dirt doubletrack on the Transylvania Trail route — **Dirt doubletrack.** Field roads between villages, rutted by rain and repaired by nobody. Dry, it’s fast and flowing. Wet, it’s the story you’ll tell.

Sand on the Transylvania Trail route — **Sand.** A handful of short sandy patches nobody expects in Transylvania. Brief, comic, and best ridden with your weight back.

Overgrown path on the Transylvania Trail route — **Overgrown path.** A track used less often, which the grass takes over every summer. In June, sometimes you can only guess where it goes, but you ride it anyway.

The Trail

Two routes. One start line.

You leave from Sibiu and come back to Sibiu. No shuttles, no transfers. Your car and bike bag wait where you left them.

Two bikepackers climbing a gravel road past a lone tree, forested hills behind. — **For riders used to big days back to back.** The full gravel menu. Typically completed in four to five days.

The full route on a map of southern Transylvania: 530 km and 6,000 m of climbing, 25–30 June 2027, from Sibiu to Făgăraș, Sighișoara, Cetatea de Baltă, Sebeș and back. — **For riders used to big days back to back.** The full gravel menu. Typically completed in four to five days.

A bikepacker riding a quiet road above rolling green hills. — **For a first bikepacking adventure, or a long weekend.** About three days to complete.

The short route on a map of southern Transylvania: 350 km and 3,200 m of climbing, 25–30 June 2027, from Sibiu along the Olt, north to Sighișoara, past Biertan and Richiș and back. — **For a first bikepacking adventure, or a long weekend.** About three days to complete.

See what the route holds.

The Transylvania Trail 2027 guide. Inside:

What makes Transylvania worth the trip.
Which route fits you, and how many days to plan.
The bike to bring, and the surface many riders underestimate.
How to make it more than a ride.

Get the guide. We’ll remind you when registration opens.

Before you sign up

Is this for me?

It’s not a race

No ranking, no cut-offs, no clock but yours. First or last, it’s the same finish line. One rule: be out of the forest before dark.

Any capable bike

Gravel on 45 mm tyres, hardtail or e-MTB. All three finished the first edition. So did one road bike, pushed through the rough bits.

Your bed, your call

Nothing is booked for you. Hotels, village spare rooms, a discreet wild camp: you pick, you book. Most riders mix them.

The region

Transylvania is a feeling, not just a place.

“It’s the timelessness of it which is so remarkable, almost out of some of those stories one used to read as a child. It’s quite remarkable. People are yearning for that sense of belonging and identity and meaning!”

King Charles III, then Prince of Wales, on Transylvania

A bikepacker riding through tall grass above Biertan, its fortified church on the hill behind. — **Five UNESCO sites.** Viscri, Biertan, Saschiz, Câlnic and Sighișoara, all on the full route.

Two bikepackers riding through a meadow framed by old pines and forest. — **Some of Europe’s last primeval forest.** Trees older than the roads, and meadows among the richest anywhere outside a national park.

Two riders on cobbles under the timbered gate tower of Sighișoara citadel. — **Yes, that Dracula.** Sighișoara, one of Europe’s best-preserved lived-in medieval citadels, and birthplace of Vlad the Impaler.

Sheep grazing on a green hillside, the snow-streaked Făgăraș mountains behind. — **Transhumance.** Shepherds still walk their flocks to the high pastures the way they have for centuries.

An old wooden water trough in front of blue and green Saxon houses in Viscri. — **The King’s village.** King Charles has a house in Viscri, and has helped it stay exactly as you’ll find it.

Three bikepackers riding a dirt track between rows of vines. — **Weinland since 1177.** The Târnave valley has made wine for eight centuries. The Jidvei cellars still press the harvest.

Two bikepackers riding through the baroque gate of Alba Iulia citadel. — **Built to defend.** A star fortress at Alba Iulia. Three walls at Biertan, never conquered. A moat at Făgăraș.

A rider crouched in the back of an old covered farm cart. — **Horse carts on the gravel.** They still share the dirt roads with you, loaded loose with hay and moving at walking pace.

A table of Romanian dishes from above: polenta, ciorbă, mici, cheese and fresh vegetables. — **Farm to table, before it had a name.** Families still cook only what they grow. Țuică poured before you’ve sat down.

“If yesterday impressed me a lot, today is just nuts. An incredible kaleidoscope of landscapes and experiences: from trails along narrow overgrown paths by the river, to downhill at good speeds through forests and between trees, from downhill on roads to fields, from Roma villages to little Saxon houses. Lots of adrenaline and satisfaction. But there’s no way to take photos in the most interesting spots, because there’s nothing to do there except descending or climbing and surviving 🤪.”

Dzianis · Poland

“Almost a month has passed, but Transylvania still feels fresh in my mind. Epic views, good company and an experience that stays with you.”

Klemen · Slovenia

“It was an experience … A great feeling of freedom. Almost like riding a horse in no man’s land.”

2026 rider

“The single track section after Bunești I’ll never forget. Quite unexpected and surprising in a good way, we were laughing all the way 😄”

2026 rider

“…micile interacțiuni de pe traseu cu participanții, oameni extraordinari.”

…the small moments along the route with the other riders. Extraordinary people.

2026 rider

“Traseul e surprinzător de plăcut, uneori greu, dar mereu îți răsplătește fiecare efort cu ceva inedit. Pe măsură ce-l parcurgi îți descoperă zone și peisaje unice, e mereu altfel… cred că cel mai mult îmi amintesc coborârea prin pădure spre Sighișoara.”

The route is surprisingly enjoyable, sometimes hard, but it always rewards every effort with something new. The further you ride, the more unique places and landscapes it reveals, always different… I think what I remember most is the descent through the forest to Sighișoara.

2026 rider

Via Transilvanica

An art gallery with gravel between the rooms.

You’ll also ride part of the Via Transilvanica, the 1,400 km trail that crosses Romania. Every kilometre of it is marked by a milestone carved by hand from andesite, and no two are the same. More than 80 artists made them. Together they form one of the largest open-air sculpture exhibitions in the world.

You don’t visit it. You ride past it, one kilometre at a time.

Via Transilvanica · TIME magazine, World’s Greatest Places 2024

A carved Via Transilvanica milestone with the orange T and a coat of arms, on the green below the fortified church in Biertan.

The Trailblazers

First edition, 4–10 June 2026.

No stories to go on. Just a GPX file and a start line. The Trailblazers turned it into a ride.

Their film is coming. Your start line is 25 June 2027.

A rider’s view of a forest track over the handlebar, first Transylvania Trail, June 2026.

Alone, together

Strangers in Sibiu. Friends by the finish.

Self-supported doesn’t mean alone. The field is small, and the same faces keep turning up: at the village shop, on the long climb, at the guesthouse table in the evening. By day three you know their names.

“…it was really awesome that Bogdan joined me and Klemen… He’s an awesome guy and I’m pretty sure we’ll meet again and be friends for life. 💪🏽”

Oskar · Slovenia

Three riders with muddy bikes, arms around each other at the Transylvania Trail finish in Sibiu.

Give something back

Leave more than tyre tracks.

The ecologist Andrew Jones calls this “the last truly medieval landscape in Europe”. It looks that way because the land is still worked the old way, on small family-run farms. Hay meadows are mown, not ploughed. Life follows the land and the seasons: haymaking in June, harvest in late summer, the flocks coming down from the mountains in autumn.

You can help keep it that way. Stock up at the village shop, eat at a family’s table, sleep in a guesthouse. Every stop supports the people who look after it.

Say hello, and leave time for the answer.

It’s not why you came. It may be what you remember.

Two loaded gravel bikes leaning against a wooden porch in a village, a small dog on the cobbled lane beside them.

Two riders climbing a tarmac pass road with the forested hills and plain of southern Transylvania opening out behind them.

How it works

From your sofa to the Trail, in five steps.

1 Join the listGet the Transylvania Trail 2027 guide. We’ll remind you when registration opens.
2 RegisterOpens 15 December 2026. First come, first served.
3 Get the GPXRoute files, kit list and the rider guide.
4 Arrive in SibiuStart on 25 June. Free parking.
5 RideEat, ride, swap stories, sleep. Repeat until Sibiu.

Straight answers

Before you ask.

A gravel bike with 45 mm tyres and low gearing, a hardtail MTB, or an e-MTB — all three finished the first edition. With no ranking, none is the wrong choice; pick the one you’ll enjoy 530 km on.

All questions →

25–30 June 2027

See what the route holds.

The Transylvania Trail 2027 guide. Inside:

What makes Transylvania worth the trip.
Which route fits you, and how many days to plan.
The bike to bring, and the surface many riders underestimate.
How to make it more than a ride.

Get the guide. We’ll remind you when registration opens.