Bus rides are never boring with Cristina! She keeps us fully informed on everything Romanian. Today’s lesson is the economy where we learn the history from communist times to the transition (during which inflation and unemployment sky rocketed which caused a huge number of Romanians to leave the country. There is still a large number who have not returned, which causes other issues we’ll hear about later). We talk about income taxes GDP and salaries, cost of living etc. It totally keeps us occupied during the before and after lunch drive.
While I take a ton of notes (that I’ll not bore you with here), most of the time is spent gazing out at the ever changing countryside flying by the bus windows. We start out in the rolling hills of farmland with fields stretching as far as the eye can see. Then we slowly start our climb through the foothills of the Carpathian mountains until we reach the Red Lake basin at about 3200 feet elevation. The forests are gorgeous up here with huge pines and deciduous trees adding a teeny, tiny bit of color. The lake is the largest natural mountain lake in Romania and has little stumps that rise up out of the water, which are actually pine trees that are in flooded areas. It makes it a little tricky to sail on the lake, but Cristina says people do – so, hey, hats off to those crazy Romanians! Passing the lake (not very good picture opportunities through the bus window) we arrive at our luncheon location, the Red Lake Hotel, in a lovely setting surrounded by forested hills (not actually on the Lake – at least not close enough for us to get to the lake in the allotted time we have after lunch).
We’ve already pre-ordered (that’s the drill on this trip, we pre-order our included lunches a day or two in advance, which then ensures that none of remember what we ordered or what we will eat!), and it turns out today that we have a delicious broccoli cream soup with either lake trout (for me) or Duck confit (for Ed) and some sort of overly sweet chocolate cake with custard on top. The fish was surprisingly good (from the non-fish eater) and Ed said the Duck was as well. We’ll not go hungry on this trip – no matter what they serve us!
Back on the bus, we now head into the Bicaz Gorge area, which is said to be one of the most stunning sights in Romania. The road winds through 8 km of huge cliffs on one side and sheer drop offs on the other. The gorge was formed by the Bicaz River, which we follow through the cavernous mountain passes and down towards Moldavia (the county not the country). We stop after 45 minutes at a little souvenir village carved out of the mountain pass so we can take pictures off the bus, and really get the feel for just how large and tall these rocky mountain cliffs towering over us actually are. As we stretch our legs and observe the scenery, two horse drawn carts pass through the village – packed full of hay (ostensibly stock piling for the coming winter). We’ve seen these carts here and there, and we’ll see more as we move through the trip, but it’s a stark reminder that modern technology hasn’t reached – or at least hasn’t been adopted – many parts of this country.
We return to the bus for another 2 hours of riding through craggy mountain passes, then down into the foothill region of Moldavia, on our way to Piatra Neamt, the capital city of the Neamt county. As we enter more populated areas, I have my own Girl on a Train (or bus as it may be) moment. No, I didn’t see a murder being committed, but for some reason I was struck by all the little domestic scenes happening as we sped by on our bus. Maybe because the weather was so balmy, or maybe it was nothing unusual, but many, many residents were out in their yards allowing me a fast glimpse into their lives: One couple in an intensely emotional-looking bear hug; a young family in a yard helping Grandma hang laundry with the dad (??) playing with a baby in a stroller; one random cow with its owner walking behind it; a guy staring down his goat; an old lady at the door of her house with an old man in the front yard raking up what looked like big, thin tree branches; a family of 4, all middle aged, sitting on the front porch staring out into space. It was this fascinating study of human nature and life – all flashing by below the bus windows in mere seconds.
Houses whizzed by us too, in all shapes and sizes and stages of building. Some were complete, some were block only with no façade, some were not even enclosed yet. The roofing was different here too. There were new blue roofs, and corrugated metal roofs, riveted together in sheets – not the wooden tabs we’ve seen previously in Transylvania and Muntenia. Possibly because the weather here is more harsh? Or maybe it is just the regional style. We don’t know, and I never remembered to ask Cristina about it.
To keep us occupied – and well fed – Cristina handed out cookies (which she called biscuits) midway through our drive. She’s great with keeping our minds occupied and sugar levels up so we don’t miss a thing!
It’s not very long after we leave the gorge that we arrive in Piatra Neamt and the Central Plaza Hotel, which turns out to be the most challenging of our lodgings. While the bags are being sorted out, we go upstairs to our room, where the air conditioning isn’t working, the temperature says it is 29.6C and the window only opens a sliver (as is the case in most European locations). It’s not comfortable at all, so we call downstairs to ask for someone to come up and take look, and I also go downstairs to talk to Cristina to see if she can help. It turns out the guy who can help is handling the bags and will be a while, but she offers to switch rooms with us and we go up to her room to see if the A/C works there. It’s the same, but a much bigger room and not quite as hot and stuffy. We decide to see what happens with the A/C guy, and both return to our separate posts – me in our room waiting, she downstairs with the luggage.
The guy finally comes up, messes with the thermostat, calls down to the desk, gets some other phone number, calls that number, talks rapid fire in Romanian, says something to effect of “Scheisse!” (which we interpret to mean “shit!”) and tells us he has to go check with his supervisor because the A/C is off. We were afraid of that…..meanwhile though, the A/C is on and quite comfortable in the hallways – which we make a point of telling him, and asking to get it turned on in the rooms as well. As we are going through all this, the ladies down the hall are sweating it out too, and the photo bomber guy as well, who has come down to see what’s going on. We give the guy all our room numbers, hoping for some solution. In the meantime, we all keep our doors open to the hallway and the windows open hoping for some breeze. After a bit, another hotel employee comes up, gives us a big liter bottle of cold water, with his apologies, and says the A/C is off and there is nothing they can do, but it’s going to go down to 0C tonight and we should be fine. Yeah, right. It’s going down to more like 18C which is not going to be all right, but what can we do? Besides bitch and moan that is. Which we all do for the next 2 days!
That settled – not satisfactorily, but settled nonetheless – we strike out into the streets to scope out the restaurant we have chosen for this evening (another one that Cristina recommends as well) and hit the grocery store for supplies. Back in the hot room, we organize a bit, take showers to try to cool off, then head over to Turnul Berarilor (or Tunnel Brewers). We are thankful we scoped it out before, because it is hard to figure out where to enter. There are 2 sets of doors, one leading into a dark and “romantic” sort of dining area, another into a beer hall, long table sort of area – so its all very confusing. Plus, again, it’s a sort of pub like thing where you are supposed to just walk in and sit down. We still aren’t used to that so we ask someone who appears to be a waiter for a table for 2 – he just looks at us like we are crazy but does get someone else to come help us. They take us to the beer hall room and plop us down at a 6 top. Ok – what ever you want!
Eventually the server comes over with the menus, and we order beer and wine, then since I’m not especially hungry, I just get a Caesar salad, while Ed orders the smoked meat platter and we are talked into the house bread (for which there is always a charge – but what the heck!). Settled in with our drinks, the food appears relatively quickly. The salad is huge with tons and tons of bacon on top – right up my alley! – and the smoked meat platter is equally up Ed’s alley (and equally huge!). And the bread are these great little garlicky rolls – well worth the charge and the carbs. As we dig in, another couple, Dick and Diane, arrive looking for seats, so we ask them to join us and spend the rest of the evening getting to know each other and enjoying the good company.
Dinner ends too soon and it's back to the hot house. Sigh. Although, with the window open (and the door for a bit) in the end, the room isn’t all that horribly, terribly bad - and we might as well get used to it, we have 2 nights here with no alternative. Ah well…
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