Off the grid, Maramures to Bukovina

Northern Romania, 6-24 degrees Celsius

Romanian roads have different conditions ranging from perfect tarmac, to patchwork tarmac with ridges to gravel roads to gravel roads with potholes and rocks to horse tracks. Unfortunately the gps does not make this distinction when calculating the most appropriate route, resulting in some involuntary but exciting off-road riding. After a dead-end gravel road and riding up and down the same valley we take a shortcut and end up at a horse track. Luckily we have the appropriate tyres and we manage to cross over to the next valley, passing three horse carts along the way. After some normal tarmac we end up at a gravel road again, heading uphill into the forest. This leads us into a national park close to the border with Ukraine (we learned later).

Since it is getting colder and slightly dark we need to pitch our tent somewhere soon. We run into a small open space where a large German overland truck is parked for the night and decide to put up our tent next to it. Rolf and Christina offer us some drinks and we have a pleasant, warm evening inside their truck. In the night we are startled by some kind of animal heading off with our empty bean cans. The next morning, we learn that there are bears and wolves in this area, but according to the local forester ‘these are not dangerous’.

The next morning we continue the gravel road and find out that we are completely not where we intended to go. Instead of going south we went east in the direction of the province Bukovina. This area is famous for its painted monasteries. These were built, amongst others, in order of Stefan the Great in the 14^th and 15^th century after fighting back the Turks.

We stay at campsite “De Vuurplaats”in Fundu Moldovei, run by a very kind Dutch couple. Here we meet fellow travellers Elly and Adrian (UK), helping us out with some motorcycle maintenance and sharing a few beers. They have already been on the road for a year. There are quite some campervans as well and the next morning a nice retired Dutch couple invites us for a coffee while sharing stories about travelling. We decide to spend a few days here and visit the monasteries of Moldovita, Sucevita and Putna. All are still in use today and especially the atmosphere at Putna the monk monastery is very special: Monks chanting inside a white monastery surrounded by a rose garden and thick brick walls at the end of a small green valley. Unfortunately no pictures allowed in this monastery, so you just have to go and see it for yourself!