Romania
Initially on entering northern Romania I was less than impressed with what I assumed was going to be the norm. Long valleys with one village morphing into the next for what seemed like hours. The mountainous nature of the countryside means that every square inch of the valley that can be built upon is.Luckily driving further south saw the villages thin out as the valleys became wider. In one town we managed to pick up a replacement battery for our solar storage, mainly for the fridge, which has been performing poorly lately. It has been far more cloudy here than we expected with frequent violent thunderstorms. The lack of sunshine means that our solar reserves are continually run down.
The amount of rubbish in the rivers here is staggering. One lake we camped near appeared to be the final destination for the rubbish on this particular stretch of river. The floating plastic bottles were several metres wide in places around the shoreline. People still fish here, apparently oblivious to or necessarily accepting of the scene before them. Such a beautiful natural environment destroyed!
Plastic has to be given a value to encourage the people to recycle and single use products banned. Plastic polystyrene food trays and knives and forks are still used everywhere here and thrown on the ground after one use.
On the other hand found some beautiful camping in a flood retaining basin for a couple of days. Surrounded by sheep and cattle and their shepherds during the day. And reasonably clean. As is the norm we took some extra rubbish away with us so as to leave each campsite we use better than we found it.
Managed to get some maintenance done on the truck as well.
 |
Houses and Pensions(hotels) had these beautifully carved wooden entries. It was great to see that the skills are alive and well with new gateways a common sight.
|
 |
Inside a wooden church.
|
 |
These fantastic wooden church works of art are not a dying art in Romania's north. We saw new ones being erected in small villages.
|
 |
This was the entry gate to one of the wooden churches. We saw no other tourists along this northern part of Romania just south of the Ukrainian border.
|
 |
Yet another lovely wooden church in a remote village in the Maramures Region.
|
 |
After cutting the grass sometimes with a sythe by hand, it's forked up over these fence type structures in the fields to dry before it is stored in barns or piled into small haystacks built around a pole.
|
 |
Horse drawn carts are a common sight. The horses always have those red tassels on their bridles.
|
 |
Romanian county side.
|
 |
Another fantastic wooden church high in the mountains.
|
 |
We camped two nights high in a mountain meadow. Woken in the morning by the cow bells of a herd grazing all around us. We had to bang on the camper wall to stop some of them rubbing themselves on our truck.
|
 |
This was the view in the other direction from that camp, it's a new monastery being constructed on a ridge below us.
|
 |
 |
More hay drying racks.
|
 |
Another example of the artistic flare of Romanians. The humble facia and down pipe.
|
 |
And the winner of the shiniest roof is?
Have no idea what material they have used, but you can see it for miles.
|
 |
On the other hand as Rob said above, the plastic rubbish is out of control. Most countries have no functioning system to deal with it and this is the result.
|
 |
Get a load of this unique church, each panel beautifully painted. Just on the side of the road in a little out of the way village.
|
 |
Hard yakka raking up grass in the hot sun.
|
 |
Yes thats right bear safaris in Romania.
|
 |
Bee trucks, now that's a good idea! They camp nearby and sell honey on the roadside.
|
 |
Camped two nights here on a large grassy common come flood retarding basin. The local shepherd with his five Romanian sheep dogs, thats one on the right, grazed around us most of the day.
|
 |
This big hairy brute came a bit to close for Rob's liking.
|
 |
I zoomed in to get this shot of gypsy's on the far side of the common watching over their assortment of animals.
|
 |
Back into civilisation we visited a lovely medieval walled town.
|
 |
Great to walk around before the tourists emerge from their hotels.
|
 |
Got the place to ourselves.
|
 |
A town down the road had a similar tower accept this one has a huge crack.
|
 |
We camped up a forested valley but the thunder storm overnight blocked our way out with this fallen tree. Fortunately with our trusty truck we managed to wiz over the paddocks and escape.
|
 |
Extraordinary church in Fagaras beside the mote around the Palace Fortress.
|
 |
Fagaras Fortress.
|
 |
Fagaras Palace throne room.
|
 |
Starting the long Transfagarasan Drive switchbacks by the dozen over a high pass.
|
 |
Not far from the top.
|
 |
The mist rolls up the valley just near the top.
|
 |
Plenty of these structures to protect us from rock or snow falls.
|
 |
Through a tunnel now down the other side.
|
 |
Water pouring off the mountains after a heavy shower.
|
 |
We found a side track halfway down to camp the night. We took our bear spray( that we still had from Canada) on our walks up the valley because there were warning signs of bears in the area.
|
 |
Saw many gypsy ladies in very colourful long skirts and scarves in Romania. This is a group moving camp.
|
 |
Common to see horse and carts. Then around the corner a late model BMW flies past.
|
 |
These shrines were everywhere.
|
 |
Most houses have a working well in the front yard. And often there was a large communal well in the street all with uniquely designed roofs and sides.
|
 |
Another bee truck.
|
 |
Look there's another one.
|
 |
Just a casual shot of the road.
|
 |
We camped up here overlooking the Danube River, before we crossed the border into Serbia, for two nights accompanied by a herd of beautiful cows. I picked blackberries from nearby and bought wild raspberries from roadside stalls but didn't bother with the yellow forest mushrooms they looked a bit sus.
|
