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  • Journeys of a voyager

acrossRomania

Cycling from Timișoara in the West of Romania, to Constanța, on the cost of the Black Sea En savoir plus
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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager
    Shrine

    The shrines along the roads

    29 juin 2018, Roumanie ⋅ 🌧 20 °C

    The morning weather was not promising, and I kept refreshing my weather apps every once in a while looking for a glimpse of hope manifested in rain not falling for an hour or two. When it happened like that around the noon, I was ready to leave the town and cycle towards dryer south.

    On the stretch of 40 km, that's how much Pitești, the county capital, is away from Curtea de Argeș, one can find numerous shrines next to the road. This one is a bit specific, hence the photo. Unlike the other ones, this one is open towards the road.

    Other shrines are more closed, looking almost shed-like, with the walls inside decorated with icons (think of frescoes, not My Computer), candles, little bench and so on. Families erect them to honor their ancestors and the church blesses them. Often, they would have a well dug next to it.

    I stopped to take a photo, peek into the well, but haven't tried the water though. This well is open, which means a lot of dust and specs floating around. Other wells are mostly closed with a lid and they are in front of people's houses.
    I ate the plums though 😊    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    I like it industrial and hard-working

    29 juin 2018, Roumanie ⋅ 🌧 21 °C

    This is an accumulation lake on Argeș river, just outside of Pitești. There's another one, right after the city. It looked like a great resource and community asset. Places such as these add so much to the quality of life.

    Forgive me, fathers of architecture, for I have sinned #acrossRomania. I said that I liked Pitești, an industrial city, with nothing much that stands out, more than Sibiu, a medieval town with a rich cultural and historic life. The thing is, Pitești had to work on improving its city center.

    Things were not given to the current generation of people living there on a silver platter. They did not have medieval squares, cobblestone streets... yet they turned a boring city core surrounded by brutalist buildings into a living and breathing promenade.

    The center is full of locals, instead of tourists, the green area felt multidimensional and interactive. Unfortunately, I was not able to capture the spirit I felt, so you'll have to find satisfaction in architectural details 😊

    As I cycled just 40 km today, I decided that I'll not stop in the city or around it, but instead continue further down the road.    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager
    Bite markBite mark

    Small dogs don't go to heaven

    29 juin 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ☁️ 22 °C

    I stopped here to admire the view...and to rub some alcohol onto a bite mark made by a dog in a village just a half mile away. It ran after me even after the owner shouted that she must not do that. I didn't see her coming and it felt like I was hit with a stone.
    There, I've survived it. All I have to do now is wipe off this foam around my mouth. 😁    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager
    Oil drill
    Lower Wheel municipality & Little Wheel village

    The third wheel and production of oil

    30 juin 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 21 °C

    The road to Bucharest was both uneventful and busy with traffic, once I came closer to Ilfov county, a district-like county around the capital.

    One of the two highlights were old, but still operational oil fields.
    Romanian oil production is at an all-time low level this year. It's on a steady decline path, but even with that decline, they were in the top 30 countries by crude oil production in 2017.

    The other highlight was a sign with the name of a village and a municipality it belongs to, and they translate to:
    "Lower Wheel municipality,
    Little Wheel village".
    I felt like the third wheel, so I left 😄    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    Recharging

    1 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 24 °C

    Time for another short, but active break. Meeting with my family and relatives, exploring Bucharest on foot and, of course, 🔌🔋🔋🔋🔋😄

    The city reminds me of Belgrade, Serbia.

    I was in Bucharest on another road trip 7 years ago, so didn't spend much time now in the city. Washing clothes and recharging were the priority 😅

    I liked cycling in the city traffic though, and that usually means I like the city too 😁    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    Beekeeping 101

    3 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    After a two-day break in Bucharest and Bucegi mountains, I was back in the saddle.

    This is the first time I've seen this approach to beekeeping. Park the hives in a sunflower field 😅

    The man is giving a signal to other villagers that it's safe to move cattle across the street.
    Families around here have a cow or two and they escort it to and from fields they graze on. Another moment of social interaction for the villagers.

    Little control room on an accumulation lake outlet. One of many lakes and ponds before the channel finally flows into the Danube.

    And just across the road from the accumulation lake, there's a Gypsy family makeshift settlement.
    They saw me snapping a photo and they protested very vocally 🙄
    I didn't want to stay and explain the principles of photography in public places.    En savoir plus

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    Throw a tent anywhere, that's a camp now

    4 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C

    It's so easy to camp #acrossRomania. I was woken up by the sound of a truck slowing down, surprised by my tent, then they just continued 😅
    I met them an hour's later on their way back, tree loggers.

    I'm just a couple of kilometers from the ferry, but the path became almost impassable, tractor tracks retaining water, little muddy swamps, through which I try to rush, only to end up whipped by scratchy branches. Sweaty skin reacts as if I touched poisonous ivy and starts itching.

    As the Danube is close and a lot of swampy ground, the mosquito symphony on the outer layer of the tent last night was terrifying.
    With the daylight, some other insects came to say hi. This monster was 2 cm (almost an inch) long.    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    Should I pop to Bulgaria, or should I go

    4 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

    Close to the city of Călărași, there's a ferry that can take passengers across the Danube, either to 🇧🇬 Bulgaria or to 🇷🇴 Romania. As I wanted to reach Constanța and the Black Sea ASAP, I decided to skip visiting Bulgarian city of Silistra.

    The ferry is free for passengers and bicycles.

    The paved road is in Romania, the unpaved one as well. But the buildings in the background are in Bulgaria (town of Silistra). A border fence runs at some places just 10 m away from the buildings and is often being masked with thick foliage.    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    Dobruja

    4 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    The last leg of the trip took me through a history-rich region called Dobruja, today split between Romania and Bulgaria. Throughout its history, it's been ruled by Gets, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Bulgarians, Mongols, Wallachians, Ottomans and finally Romanians.

    Its rich history reflects the best in this monastery building. You could put it in so many contrasty geographic locations and still find that it blends nicely.

    Another thing that's present in abundance are the hills.
    Every cyclist is in a love-hate relationship with them.    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    Salami-backed trust and a tandem-couple

    4 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    Met a new friend when stopping to cool down and have a lunch break. I gained her trust with salami. She was moving in closer and closer, ending up eating from my hand, but in such a calm way, unlike the other dogs I met, that I enjoyed feeding her more than having lunch myself 🐶❤️

    Here I also met an older German couple on a tandem. Caught up with them in the next village. The summer shower caught up with all of us while we were in a village shop. When the rain stopped they decided they will stop at the edge of the village in a cyclist-friendly camp, but I figured out I could push some more before it gets dark...or rainy again.    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    Welcome to Civitas Tropaensium!

    5 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 22 °C

    When thinking about the day ahead I thought the highlight would be finally reaching Constanta, after I drop by a nearby monument I was told to check out. Sure, let's do it!

    If I had only realized last night how close I was to the ruins of this ancient city, I would have cycled that extra mile #acrossRomania and made my camp inside the city walls.
    Welcome to Civitas Tropaensium! This castrum (military camp) became a city within a century.

    The settlement was founded by emperor Traian and initially inhabited by Roman veterans of the Dacian Wars which ended in 106 AD.
    Fun-fact: Before the battle of Tapae (101 AD) the Dacian tribe, the Buri, sent Traian a message saying that he should withdraw from Dacia and restore peaceful relations. The message was in Latin, inscribed on the smooth top of a very large mushroom 😂

    Emperors Constantine the Great and Licinius rebuilt the city in the 4th century and it became an important religious center with several basilicas in the city. Here is what remained of The Simple Basilica. Walking between those colonnades felt out of this world.

    Civitas Tropaensium was at its highest in the 6th century when it was a bishopric, but later in that century it was sacked by the Avar tribes and stopped being an important city of Dobruja region. Today, it's abandoned, there are no admission fees.

    Another thing that excited me as much as the colonnades in the basilica is the sanitary channel which ran across the city and collected all the wastewater, mixing it with running water and taking it out of the city. #acrossRomania

    Bonus: Barcelona was initially a Roman castrum.    En savoir plus

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    Tropaeum Traiani

    5 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 22 °C

    Some 2 km away from the fortress, in 109 AD, emperor Traian built a monument, called Tropaeum Traiani (Traian's trophy) to honor the fallen Roman soldiers (don't mix Roman and Romanian) and also to warn any neighboring tribe to stay away from just conquered province.

    Behind the monument, there is a mound, tumulus, a burial site of a fallen Roman general. This is the view from the top of it. Unfortunately, there's nothing much to see at the mound, at least not to my untrained eye, so back to the monument 🤔

    Tropaeum Traiani monument was reconstructed in 1977, as by that time it turned into a pile of rubble, with the metopes (squarish elements depicting various elements of the Roman army) scattered around it.
    Here you can see some original parts of the monument exposed.

    The original elements of the monument are preserved in a museum in a nearby town of Adamclisi. The monument was devoted to the Roman god of war, Mars.
    The admission to the ground around the monument costs 10 Lei (2€ / ~$3).

    I had the luck to come across an old tour guide there who told me that in the middle of the photo here, in what look like battlements, there are prisoners of war shown, Dacians in skirts, Sarmatians in tunics and Germanic tribesmen in trousers.

    Fun-fact: the Dacian campaign was the only known instance when the Roman legions had to make adjustments to their equipment during the campaign. Dacians #acrossRomania used a curved weapon sharp on the inside, called falx, which could cut through Roman armor.    En savoir plus

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  • Journeys of a voyageracrossRomaniaJourneys of a voyager

    Come rain or come rain

    5 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ 🌧 27 °C

    No matter how much I'd like to stay and soak the atmosphere at the Traian's monument, the weather forecast said there will be rain showers, so I reluctantly started cycling...only to be greeted by the first outpouring. I have rain gear on, but I still seek shelter under a tree.

    And every time the showers would get tired and stop, the scenery would become so contrasty and so beautiful, that even just throwing a camera in the air would lend you a great shot. The report says there's no rain in Constanța, so I'll continue and endure the rain.    En savoir plus

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    The Constanța casino

    5 juillet 2018, Roumanie ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C

    When planning where to finish this tour, Constanța and its casino were the obvious choices. I fell in love with that building ever since I saw it for the first time somewhere on the internet.
    In the current form since 1910, it worked as a casino for only 38 years.

    It was called Romanian Monte Carlo and it has always been the symbol of the city. It was damaged in every world war and rebuilt afterward.
    With the communist regime in power, it ceased to operate like a casino, and since 1948 it served as a house of culture.

    Built in Art Noveau style by 32-year old Daniel Renard, it was a sore point for the entire political opposition and conservatives back in the day, who wanted something less extravagant and in popular Neo-Romanian style, which was featured in many of my photos.

    And so, after 12 days of cycling (rest days not counted) and after exactly 900 km (560 miles) I reached the promenade in front of the iconic casino in Constanța.
    I was so happy with the casino milestone that I didn't even consider staying longer in the city 😁

    I spotted a place where I could urban-camp and rushed to the train station to check if I could exchange the train ticket that I had bought in Bucharest for a train leaving tomorrow, for the one leaving tonight. Sure enough, I could. I left the city as fast as I entered it.

    The ease with which I called it the end just reaffirmed Emerson's words, that it's not the destination, it's the journey.    En savoir plus

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    Fin du voyage
    5 juillet 2018