Halloween at Dracula’s castle treat for Canadians
Ottawa siblings win Airbnb contest to sleep at Gothic pile that inspired Stoker’s novel
For most, spending an evening in Dracula’s lair on Halloween would be a nightmare.
But for two Canadians, it’s an “exciting childhood dream.”
After winning a worldwide competition with Airbnb for a one-night stay at Bran Castle in Romania, Tami Varma and her brother Robin packed their belongings and flew out of Ottawa on 12 hours’ notice to the bottom of the aged edifice which inspired the Dracula legend.
There, they were met Monday afternoon by a horse and buggy and headed up the Carpathian Mountains.
The two then explored every nook and cranny in the fortress, looking for more hidden secrets in the 14thcentury castle where Vlad the Impaler, the prince who inspired Bram Stoker’s 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula, is believed to have stayed.
“We’re getting fired up,” Tami said after enjoying a candlelit dinner — with, of course, no silverware.
The two also tested out coffins Tami describes as “more comfortable than her own bed” and lined with red velvet.” There’s an eerie amount of “evil in the walls, you can feel it,” she said. “But it’s exciting, it’s surreal.”
Admittedly, Tami knows her fascination is not of common interest to most, but her love for the Count began when she was born and raised in Halifax with her grandfather Devendra Varma, a notable scholar and professor of English Gothic literature at Dalhousie University for 31 years.
An expert in vampire lore, back in 1976, Devendra made the same journey to see the castle, but in those days he had to hike up — there was no horse and buggy, and no path.
“He passed away in1994 but his love lives through us,” she said. “I grew up surrounded by stories and statues of vampires, witches, warlocks and goblins,” adding their copy of Dracula was autographed by the author.
When she first saw the contest on Facebook, she dropped everything and spent several hours perfecting her application — 550 words on “What you would say to Dracula if you were face to face.” Although she thought it was a longshot, she urged her brother and father to apply. Days later, she received the call she had been waiting for — she had beat out 88,000 other hopefuls — and left everything behind to walk in her grandfather’s footsteps for one night.
“I really appreciate this weird, special, and interesting childhood we’ve had,” she said. “And now it’s an experience of a lifetime, I can definitely feel our grandfather’s spirit in the castle.”