Pitești is a mid-sized city of around 160,000 people in southern Romania, sitting at the foot of the Carpathian foothills along the Argeș River. It's the capital of Argeș County and one of Romania's more industrially significant cities — home to the Dacia car factory — though visitors mostly use it as a base for exploring the beautiful surrounding county.
The city itself is pleasant without being particularly remarkable. The compact Centrul Vechi has a decent pedestrian zone, a few parks, and an easy-going provincial pace. The Argeș County Museum gives a solid grounding in the region's history, and the Trivale Monastery in its forest park on the western edge is worth an afternoon. The Pitești Prison site is significant for anyone interested in the darkest chapters of Romanian communist history.
What makes Pitești interesting is what surrounds it: within 50–130 km you have mountain monasteries, the Fagaraș ridge, Bran Castle, and some of Romania's most scenic Carpathian countryside. If you're travelling between Bucharest and Transylvania, Pitești makes a perfectly sensible overnight stop.