Matt Hikes for a Week in the Transylvanian Alps

August 13, 2008

Hiking the Transylvanian Alps: Day #1

(Matt)

Our day today started very early, at 3:45am. Amber's flight out of Bucharest to Dallas left at 6am. So we traveled from Brasov to Bucharest and stayed near the airport (Otopani) at a very overpriced hotel called Confort Inn just to take advantage of the free 4am shuttle.

It was sad to have to part from Amber, who has been literally with me at all times for 7 1/2 months. The longest we have been apart during that entire time is about 1 hour, and that was a rare occurrence. It was also sad because of the circumstances that she was returning early.

So we did what we have done about 27 times during the trip when we have flown, checking in, getting board passes, etc., except this time I kept my bag, and Amber went through security alone. I think we are the only ones who really would think that sounded sad, after all I'll be home in about 12 days, but it was for both of us.

We ordered instant coffee out of a machine. I threw mine away because it tasted like a cockroach fogger, and we said our groggy 4:30am good byes. Amber turned to go through security, and I immediately hailed a cab and set off to Gard Nord, the Bucharest train station, to catch my 6:30am train back to Brasov, where I hoped to get another train to Victoria, the small town closest to the Fagaras Mountains, where I planned to hike for 8 days, 7 nights. I have been carrying camping gear since Argentina just to hike in Romania. That's how excited I am about these mountains. They are awesome.

Romania is gorgeous, and it will be a major European tourist destination, but it is not set up for it now. I first visited Romania in 2004, after I took the bar exam, and being back is kind of remarkable for the lack of progress that the tourist towns around the Fagaras Mountains have made in the last 4 years. Basically everything that was difficult in 2004 is still identically difficult in 2008, as if the tourists arriving asking for certain things that aren't available has in no way spawned an entrepreneur to say, "Hey, I get asked for this thing all the time and see these foreign tourists wandering around the countryside trying to get a ride to this place that they want to see....Maybe I could provide that thing and take them to that place and get money for it." The communist era in Romania is apparently still hindering the capitalist spirit and the concept of supply and demand around here. I'll give examples in discussing the painful preparations for my hike.

I got to the train station by 5am and, as I walked around, got excited by how light my bag had just gotten after sending all of the souvenirs that I've been carrying around for months home with Amber in a huge duffel bag, including several mugs, pieces of wood from Greece and a plate I bought in Egypt.

I was hungry. So I bought a little bag of "Seven Day" croissants filled with a hazelnut chocolate spread. That was it. Even the coffee shops were closed at this hour.

I sat down at my platform next to several homeless people sleeping on benches and finished reading my book by Alan Folsom called The Day After Tomorrow--no relation to the movie about global warming. The book is a really good thriller. It's pure entertainment, just like an action movie. I picked it up in Corfu at the Pink Palace in a book exchange. After that, I bought some coffee and hopped on the train.

As we were taking off, I noticed that the coffee--I was craving this coffee because I have been up for 3 hours--was leaking though the bottom, worse every second. I wanted this coffee so badly that I pulled down my pack and got out my titanium camping mug and poured the coffee into it. Then I grabbed the leaking cup and threw it into the little trash receptacle under the train window. When the trash lid came down, a huge chunk of cigarette ash plopped into the coffee. I gasped. For a second I considered drinking it anyway, and I even took a small sip of it, but it tasted so much like cigarette ashes that I spit the sip right back into the cup. I could have cried, which probably means that I should cut down on caffeine.

With no coffee, I decided to go to sleep instead. I was out like a light until the train stopped at Brasov.

At that point, the information counter helped me figure out there is still no train to Victoria, but she gave name of the town nearby, Ucea (pronounced "Uchea"). So this was to be the first stop on the ridiculous quest to get to beginning of a hike that is supposed to be one of Europe's best.

I bought the ticket and went to Brasov's city center to check email, get some cash, and see the town one more time. It was as cute as before but kind of sad with Amber gone. I didn't manage my time well, and when I got back to the train station, I only had 30 minutes to shop for my food for the hike. Luckily the supermarket was directly across the street from the station. With my 8 days worth of food purchased and packed in the heaviest backpack in the history of the world, I headed for the platform going to Ucea.

As I was running along, I was scanning the new arrivals in Brasov for an English speaker so that I could give my book away, as this was now unnecessary weight in a bag that had 8 days worth of food in it. As I did, I thought I saw a familiar face, but I wasn't sure. I might have been the first girl that I met and became friends with in South America. So many other things were going through my mind, such as not missing my train, when I first saw her that it took it a little while to register. Then I stopped dead in my tracks and turned around watching her cross the street with a guy. It sure looked like her, but with shorter hair. After she had crossed the street, I called out her name to see if it was her, "Gina!" The traffic was loud, and I thought she turned at the sound of her name and looked around, though in a different direction. I was seriously about to miss this train, and I couldn't delay this hike anymore if it was in fact going to happen. So I had to turn and run to the platform. Though she is American, I have only ever seen Gina in Ecuador and, if that was her, Romania. Pretty weird.

I rode to Ucea, catching a couple of catnaps on the way. At that point it was like a time capsule to 2004. I had sworn that if I got to hike in Romania again, I was not going through all the hassles I went through last time. Well I was wrong. I went through all the exact same hassles...and some additional ones.

I got off the train and remembered Ucea immediately. The last time I was coming from Sigoarasora. I lucked out last time because I talked some locals at the train stop--not a station, just a stop--into giving me a lift to Victoria. This time, the cars that were there left before I could talk to them. I was thinking, surely by now there is a shuttle or a bus or something to get from this stop to Victoria.

I was standing in the parking lot waiting for that bus by myself when a local girl about 25 years old walked up behind me. She spoke no English but understood Italian and, therefore, some Spanish. I asked her if there was a bus, and she said no. I asked her if there were taxis. She said no. She communicated that she needed to have a smoke before we starting walking to Victoria....so that I could then walk an additional 6kms to the mountains to BEGIN the hike. Sweet.

If I was Romanian, I would find out the times of the trains stopping at Ucea, and I would have a sign in like 5 languages propped up on my trunk that said I would take anyone to any trail head in the area for any Fagaras Mountain and/or Victoria for X Euros per kilometer. I would also sell trail maps, last minute foods stuffs, like trail mix and energy bars, batteries, flashlights propane--all out of my car that waited at the train stop. Let me tell you that if this mountain range was in Turkey, there would be an incredible cottage industry built around hiking, and it would be based in Victoria. Everyone in Victoria would have businesses set up to cater to hikers before and after their hikes. There would hotels, Internet cafes, laundry services, shuttles and taxis to and from the trail heads, massages after the hikes, pedicures after the hikes, hiking stores with gear, shoe stores with shoes, and the entire economy of Victoria would be booming. The Turkish have that mindset, and they are very entrepreneurial and know a profitable endeavour when they see it. Tourism is their third largest industry because they understand it, and they milk ever cent out of a situation like is here in Victoria.

There are a lot of hikers here, and all of us have to walk in the searing heat down the highway to Victoria, unless you get lucky, then we have to walk from Victoria to the mountains to find the trail head. In what? The searing, sweltering summer heat. By the time you begin your first hike, you are spent from the ordeal of getting to Victoria and your walk to the mountains. Why? Because Victoria not one single solitary taxi or bus to the mountains, but guess what? Victoria is geographically the best stepping off point for the hikes to the highest peaks, the main hikes people do when they come to the Transylvanian Alps. But Victoria has not one single solitary supply for camping. It's baffling.

Well I got a little lucky, the girl Valentina, who had just arrived from Rome visiting family, showed me where to walk down the highway, and she got a lift the rest of the way to town, and I kind of glommed onto her lift. After that, Valentina took me to a store, and I got some batteries for my headlamp. She was nice and, erroneously thinking I wanted a room, took me blocks out of the way to the city center, which is just sad. There is NOTHING in Victoria. So I thanked Valentina and began the incredible slog to the mountains....just like I did in 2004. I walked 6kms to the trail head, some of it on a highway but most of it on a dirt road, with the heaviest pack in the world. In all it took me 4 hours to get past the place where cars can drive; i.e., the place where an industrious Romanian could drive you for a fee. I set up camp just beyond the road, right by the trail head. I was exhausted.

August 14, 2008

Hiking the Transylvanian Alps: Day #2

(Matt)

Because I had gotten so little sleep the night before and had a very strenuous first day, I slept almost 13 hours at my first campsite, which was not scenic nor particularly pleasant, but it had a very loud river next to it, and it sat deep in the valley, being at the bottom of the mountain. So the sun didn't reach my tent until around 10am. I didn't get hiking until about 11am. While I was preparing to start the hike, several hikers came off the trail heading back to town. Then an old sheep herder came off the trail walking along with three donkeys, one of which was a tiny baby. I couldn't have known it then, but by the end of the day I was going to know this guy very well and owe him an incredible debt.

The beginning of the hike was as I had remembered, straight up, and then up, and then up some more. My pack seemed like it had a whole fat person hidden inside it. I was sweating profusely from the get go. After a while, I looked up and saw a different trail marker, a red dot outlined in white. I stopped and looked at my map and knew where I had gone wrong, just about 5 minutes back up the trail...and up a hill. I studied the map and concluded that the both trails lead to Prodragu Lake, where I wanted to camp the next day to make it easier to summit Mt. Moldoveanu, the highest peak in Romania. So the big difference was if I went the original way, the way I went last trip, which is quite lush and scenic, I would arrive at Lake Podragu from below, and if I went this other way, I would have to climb over two additional passes and arrive at Podragu from above and walk down. I concluded that, for this reason, I would not encounter other hikers because nobody but me would hike over 2 additional passes and climb an additional 670 meters just for the hell of it. In looking at the map I saw that after the first pass, there was a little lake. I decided to get to that lake, where I would be alone, stay the night, and then climb the other pass to arrive at Podragu hopefully with enough energy left to set up camp and climb to Mt. Moldoveanu the same day.

So all this sounded good. The trail was very poorly marked at first, but it was still marked. After 5 hours of hiking, I arrived at the upper end of the valley, and the trail markers disappeared and then so did the trail. I thought that there must be a mistake that I had made, like earlier, where there was a trail and even trail markers, but that I had lost them. This caused me a lot of doubling back, walking up unnecessary slopes, scrambling around in fields of stinging nettles, and crossing rivers in precarious places to search around in forests that, based upon my map, I didn't even need to be in.

So at one point I was scrambling up a muddy hill trying to recover the trail when I heard the sheep coming along below me a hundred yards or so. What I know now is that I had been inadvertently following sheep tracks, which lead everywhere and nowhere at the same time, when I was trying to locate the trail. I was exhausted and desperately searching for the trail. Pretty concerned that my nearly 6 hours of hiking uphill had been totally useless, I finally decided to break down and ask one of the sheep herders where the trail was because it was getting dark.

I walked up to the sheep herder and showed him my map. Later I learned that he can hardly see and that this was also useless. I thought the guy was telling me to just head up the mountain the way I had been going. So I started to head up again. Then about 15 minutes later, he yelled up to me to come down. I was hoping that the 8 or so barking dogs around a large stone that acted as the home base for the sheepherders would not bite me. They didn't.

When I got back down to him, he told me with hand signals that the trail no longer existed and to sleep next to his camp for the night and that he would take me up the next morning. Grateful, I set up my camp in the valley with the 8 dogs, 3 donkeys, and 2 sheepherders.

After I set up my tent, the second sheepherder arrived. Both were very friendly and patient with the fact that we could not speak the same language, though from time to time I could find a Spanish cognate that they understood. So thrilled to have a guest at the rock, they refused to let me use my propane and made me cook on their gas cooker, which was nice. While I made my pasta, the first sheepherder made a regular fire next to the rock, which was charred black with years of fires being made in the same spot, and he cooked up some really good french fries, better than you'd get in most restaurants. Throughout this process, I was forced to drink the most foul liquor.

While all this was going on, several of the dogs had gotten into my backpack and had eaten my salami and crackers, which was all I brought for lunch for 7 days of hiking.

"Mateos," the first sheepherder said very concerned, "un problema." I went to find the second sheepherder standing over my opened backpack looking rather grave. I was concerned that all of my food was gone and was relieved to find out that it was just lunch, though this would start to concern me in a couple of days. I assured them that it was no problem, but they insisted that I take my pick of any of their canned goods from their stash. They grabbed their dirty sack of canned goods and dumped them out on the ground. My choices were pork pate, sardines, or something else nasty. The issue I had with the pork pate was that it was extremely heavy. So after a lot of wrangling, I took 4 pork pates and a whole loaf of bread that night and secretly gave 2 pates back to them before I left the next morning.

The sheepherders encouraged me to take lots of pictures and made me promise to mail them hard copies and to send them a written letter, which I will do when I get back. Besides drinking hard liquor, he discussed my route around the mountains extensively. The first sheepherder was determined that I simply stay in their valley and entertain them for the next 5 days. He demanded that I just do my hiking from their valley, which was at about 1700 meters. So his plan for my third day was to get up, climb out of the valley to 2270 meters, down to Podragu at 2136 meters, then climb up to Mt. Moldoveanu at 2544, which was 3 hours away, then come back 3 hours and return into their valley. Overall, according to the first sheepherder's plan, in one day I would walk for about 10 hours and climb up at least 1000 meters only to return down 1000 meters.

The liquor we were drinking concerned me for several reasons. First of all it was in a bottle that was blank and just said "Alcohol," like a bottle of rubbing alcohol. Surely these sheepherders weren't drinking rubbing alcohol? They were then watering it down in a dirty plastic bottle that had all kind of debris floating around in it, which didn't seem sanitary. Finally, the water they were using to water the alcohol down was untreated water straight out of the stream. I personally am a freak about Giardia and always, no mater what, treat water that's not being boiled. So I was like, great, if the hiking out of this valley every day doesn't kill me, and the drinking rubbing alcohol doesn't kill me, then the Giardia will! But, to be nice, I continued to take very small, measured sips from the dirty bottle. It didn't make me sick, but it did not improve my ability to hike the next day.

As the liquor flowed, they both decided that the next night they would kill one of their sheep and cook it on the spit in my honor. For guys that live their whole lives protecting the sheep and sleeping along side the sheep and chasing them straight up mountains, the idea that they would kill one for me meant that I could not leave and do what I wanted to do in these mountains. I felt kind of checkmated by the sheep killing. I was honored but, at the same time, trapped in this valley, which seemed really deep. Turns out it was a lot deeper than it looked.

In all it was a cool night. These guys were really nice. I was wearing shorts, and when the sun set they got me blankets and sheep skins and made sure that I was not cold sitting around the campfire. The sky was perfectly clear, and you could see every star in the sky. The moon was bright. It was gorgeous. From where we were in the valley, you could actually see perfectly the lights of the city of Sibiu. Along side the campfire, the sheepherders' number one sheepdog, a super intelligent little mutt that I just loved, was curled up under my head like a pillow with its head on my shoulder.

That dog was the sweetest little thing, and the sheepherders kept bragging that they got him for 1 Euro. It took to me right from the beginning, and it responded immediately to the sheepherders' commands to go round up the sheep. It knew it was special too. None of the other dogs got near the sheepherders' food or their campfire, but this one got special privileges. One thing that kept annoying me a little was that the first sheepherder kept reaching over and hurting that little dog by pinching its nose and making it squeak in pain. After a while I stopped letting that guy see me petting the little dog because it would always remind the sheepherder that he needed to pinch the dog's nose and make him cry. I loved that little dog.

It was a great night, though I was concerned about being trapped there. Multiple times throughout the evening I got my map out and my calendar and tried to make these guys understand that I had an agenda and couldn't just live as a sheepherder for a week, but they would always blow me off and talk about the cookout. So I went to bed thinking that, while this was an interesting experience, I was now trapped and would live among the sheepherders for a week and that any hiking that I did would be extra arduous because of my location at 1600 meters.

Before bed, they told me to have my day pack ready to go at 6am. I said OK and went to bed thoroughly spent and a little buzzed. The second sheep herder slept inside a 4'X4' shelter made of sticks and plastic. The first sheepherder slept on the ground and simply wrapped himself with a piece of plastic to keep the dew (or rain) off of him. The sheep return to the same place in the valley near the rock every night, and the herders and their dogs try to block them in so that they can wake up if the sheep try to leave during the night, like they did the night I stayed with them.

I heard barking and yelling all night long but was too tired to care. I mostly slept through it. Apparently the sheep went on a walkabout around the mountains during the night, and our boys had to chase them all night in the moonlight. While this was going on, sheepherder number one stopped watering down the alcohol and got ripped.

August 15, 2008

Hiking the Transylvanian Alps: Day #3

(Matt)

I woke up reflecting how lucky I had been to find these sheepherders. I unpacked my whole bag and repacked it as a day pack for a 10 or so hour hike out of and back into this valley. I muesli inside the tent and was out and ready to roll at 6am, as I was instructed. Sheepherder number one intercepted me and told me to put my backpack inside the tent and to come have coffee, that the sheep were still sleeping and that we did not need to leave yet. While we had coffee, I was handed the bottle of the straight liquor, 97% alcohol, at about I 6:15am. I tried to decline, indicating that I usually do not drink straight hard liquor before...I mean...at least 7am, but he insisted, said it would warm me up. It was at this point that I realized that sheepherder number one was tanked at 6am. The other sheepherder some how communicated that the bottle, which was 3/4 empty, had been consumed completely by the other guy during the night. Shortly thereafter, the guy passed out. Then, as if he had been waiting for the other guy to pass out, sheepherder number two tells me to pack up all my things and that he will show me the route to the place I originally wanted to go. I was excited but told him that I would come back for the cookout in 3 days time. It was early, and I hadn't done the math. It would have been 4 days time. So I packed up everything and began one of the hardest days of hiking that I have ever experienced.

When i woke up at 4am, i was a little agitated because i was being totally hijacked/shanghaied by these sheep herders. Last I knew when we went to bed, I could go around and see all the rest of the Fagaras Mountains, but I would have to base myself out of their valley and climb 1500 meters straight up a mountain every time I wanted to leave. And though when I woke up I had never done the climb out of their valley before, I had a hunch that it would be hard....it was actually like hell.

These guys were super nice. To review, they had been nice enough to offer to show me that way up the mountain, to let me pitch my tent next to theirs, to cook me french fries and coffee, to keep making me drink Everclear from a dirty bottle with particles of dirt and ash floating in it, to allow me to cook on their gas to prevent me from using mine, to give me 4 cans of pork pate, 2 hard boiled eggs, and a whole loaf of bread to replace my salami and crackers that their dogs ate out of my pack, and to offer to slaughter one of their sheep in my honor and to cook it over their spit. This was really where the rub came in. I was told by one guy that this was happening today. So after I made the incredibly grueling hike that I just finished, I would have to return to their valley to get my things. I explained several times that i wanted to go and do my thing and then come back through, but the Vasile, who did all the talking really, wouldn't hear of it. He said that the sheep cooking would take place today.

So before I got out of my tent, I emptied everything out of my backpack except my most valued possessions, like my passport and cash, and some food and water for this day hike. I was also told 4 times that we needed to leave camp by 6am. So I set my alarm for 5:30am so that I could eat my muesli.

When I emerged from my tent, bag in hand, Vasile intercepted me and told me to put the bag back in the tent and to come have coffee, that there was no problem, and that the sheep were still sleeping because of their wild night.

At that point, I noticed that Vasile was suffering the effects of the wild night too. When I went for coffee by the big central rock where they cook, I realized that he was three sheets to the wind. Before 6am, he had already polished off 3/4 of a bottle of the generic Everclear that they were significantly watering down with water the night before, and still it had been extremely strong. So with my coffee, I was forced to sip straight Everclear at 6am. I finally, after several sips, said that it was too early in Spanish passed the remaining liquor back to him, and the other guy understood...each time I refuse to drink anymore.

During this, I tried to confirm the plan, which I hadn't liked anyway because it had me climbing several thousand additional meters up a raw mountain without any semblance of a trail, except the misleading sheep trails, and I found Vasile was mostly incapable of even speech, let alone discussing a plan that included 4 whole days of activities.

He kept yelling in Romanian, "Mateos!!," like I was his mistreated sheep dog, "There's no problem! The sheep are just sleeping," to which he would include the visual aid for sleeping. Then he would sit quietly and drink straight liquor and, out of nowhere, would remember me sitting there drinking my coffee and say it again, startling me each time with "Mateos!!" At one point while I was still trying to confirm the plan and at least get myself out of coming back to their valley after the sheep eating, he told me that he was changing my plan for today, that he wanted to see a friend in Buda Valley, in the opposite direction from where I was headed, and that was where he was taking me there instead.

So this is how it went from 6am-9am. Then he just passed out, and the quiet one asked me if I wanted to go to my original destination. I, of course, answered affirmatively, and then he told me to pack my whole bag and to catch up with him and the sheep, all of which he was taking up a very steep and difficult mountain pass just to show me the way. I confirmed that he wasn't going to kill a sheep today, and packed my stuff as fast as possible, as the sheep were already headed up the mountain. I was stoked that I had regained my plan and was glad Vasile had gotten so drunk.

The climb up the mountain out of the valley was dangerous, especially since the technical aspects of the climb were exacerbated by the weight of my bag. There was a lot of slipping, scrambling, sliding, and grabbing roots, bushes, and grass to keep from falling to my injury or death while climbing that mountain today. It was not pretty. Plus, I lost my favorite hiking hat, the one that has been with me to Big Bend every time, the Tetons, Patagonia, everywhere I've hiked for a long time... Oh well, the hat is definitely in a pretty place. Maybe the sheep herders will find it some day and wear it.

Before starting up, I was instructed to take a more direct route than the sheep, but in the end the sheep beat me to the top. The climb was slippery and steep. It took every ounce of energy in my body to get up the 280 meters to Lake Podragel, where I regained the trail. From there I had to climb another 290 meters to get over the ridge and into the valley of Podragu Lake, which sit at 2136 meters. Immediately upon finding the trail, after more than 2 hours of literally dragging myself straight up the mountain, other tourists appeared. I wonder if there is a guidebook that says not to take the "trail" I took, though the map gives the nonexistent route that I took equal billing with the main route to Podragu. There must be because I was the only person over there that was not one of those 2 sheep herders. There are a lot of screaming Romanian pre-teens and teens staying at the Prodragu Cabana tonight on some kind of church trip or something. Though only one valley away, where I was last night felt like the land of the lost over there. If it were not for that sheep herder's help today, it would have taken me twice and long to get up that mountain and avoid the extreme topographical features and pitfalls of that valley, which were many.

After coming over the pass, I saw Lake Podragel, the intended destination the day before. I tried to rest, and I ate. But it was very sunny and very windy, and I was ready to get the last straight-up section out of the way and to get to Prodrago Lake. When I got to the top of the ridge, I could see both Lake Podragel and Lake Prodrago. I couldn't believe, after my morning, that everything was so close.

When I got to Lake Prodrago, I immediately set up my tent as far from the cabana as possible, which apparently is not far enough because those kids are loud and their voices echo all over the valley, and laid down inside. I can't remember ever feeling that completely exhausted, though I'm sure I have been. I was beat. The thought of standing upright and cooking dinner made me wince. I slept very well that night.

August 16, 2008

Hiking the Transylvanian Alps: Day #4

(Matt)

I woke up at about 7am but stayed in my tent because it was still dark in the valley and, because Podragu is at 2136 meters, it was very cold and windy. I ate my cup of muesli and milk in my sleeping bag, savoring every drop, and then grabbed my day pack and started to leave. But I thought about the potential for caffeine withdrawals, and I went ahead and cooked up some coffee. At that point, I hit the road and started the climb out of the valley, which was a breeze with only a day pack containing essentials, such as valuables, compass, map, food, water, etc. When I got to the top, I was ecstatic to see nothing but clear blue skies with not even a wisp of a cloud anywhere. I was concerned that the trail would be crowded, but I didn't see another hiker until the summit, where there were about 10 Romanians. At the summit, which was calm and beautiful, I ate pork pate, and set up my camera and took a picture of my self, then headed back, stopping from time to time to set up another picture on this pristine day in the mountains. I got really lucky on the weather. Two days after this, bad weather rolled in, much like the weather on my first visit to the Fagaras Mountains. There were still sections of the hike that were very windy, like Patagonia.

When I got back to the campsite, about 6 hours after starting out, I noticed that I needed bath after 5 days, 4 of them hiking, without one. I walked over to a somewhat sheltered pond of snow melt and took an icy, take-your-breath-away bath. I was offensive smelling to myself, and this had to happen. After I was done, having used used shampoo and soap, I felt pretty good and refreshed.

While I was making coffee, I had a group of Romanian and Dutch tourists come and gather around my tent and start asking me all kinds of questions about myself, my tent, my life....it was a full-on interview. The translator for the group was originally from Spain but had lived in Holland for 40 years and had a Romanian wife. He spoke English, Spanish, Dutch, and Romanian. During our brief conversation, he had occasion to use all of them, as various members of his group had questions for me.

I also met an American Peace Corp volunteer, Zack, and his Romanian girlfriend, Michaela. He has been working in Sibiu and really likes it. He said it seemed like I was a celebrity the way those people were interviewing me.

Later on, I went to Zack and Micheala's tent, and we talked about various things for a while before bed. She said she would text message the sheepherder, who had a mobile phone by the way, and tell him I was going to be a day late. It got cold, and we said goodbye. Everyone agreed that Romania was going to be a major European tourist destination and, based upon the current trend in prices in anticipation of switching to the Euro, not a cheap one. Zack and Michaela were very nice people. I wish that I could have spent more time with them, but they left the next morning.

August 17, 2008

Hiking the Transylvanian Alps: Day #5

(Matt)

I woke up and had to start planning around my food shortage caused by the dog eating my salami on the second day. That salami was supposed to be lunch every day. I determined that I should have taken all 4 of the pork pates those sheepherders offered, but they were incredibly heavy. So I made a plan: I would try to buy something for lunch from the cabana after breakfast.

Having made a plan, I poured my cup of muesli and then the milk...which was completely curdled. The white lumps plopped into my muesli, and I thought I was going to cry. That milk had been opened for 5 days. I don't know why I was so surprised except that I figured the cold nights would act as refrigeration for at least half the day. Wrong!

So now I had a 2-fold mission at the cabana, which I had not entered in the 2 days I had been camping nearby: get something for 2 days of lunches and get something for breakfast.

I went in and, just for the hell of it, asked the lady inside if she had any food for sale. She then, in English, offered a list of things to choose from for breakfast! I must have been hungrier than I thought, or maybe it was the food predicament, but without even asking the price of any of it, I said, "I would like all of those things you just said."

So for breakfast, instead of a small cup of muesli (with rotten milk), I ate 2 fried eggs, 5 slices of salami, four pieces of bread, 2 wedges of cream cheese, and a cup of coffee. It was like heaven, the best $10 I have ever spent. One of the cool things about camping for a week is that going without the luxuries to which you are accustomed, like eggs and cream cheese, makes those very basic things feel like incredible delights when you get to have them again.

After I finished eating, I was feeling lucky. So I asked the woman at the cabana if I could buy about 1/3 of a salami. She cut it for me, took my $5, and I was back in business. That would be plenty of salami for lunch for the next 3 days. You really don't need much food when you hike. A few slices of salami and a couple squares of chocolate will do the trick as lunch.

My elaborate plan, which had me eating every morsel in my bag, placed me at the mercy of the sheep herders on the last night, night 7. In other words, if they didn't feed me a sheep, they were going to have to feed me something because I would have no food on arrival. It would be a pretty intense day.

On day 5, I saw the most beautiful scenery that I think there is in these mountains. It was really incredible, and for the majority of the day I forgot the toll that the 5 continuous days of hiking, mostly climbing with an enormously heavy bag, had taken on my body. I was pretty sore at that point. After climbing out of the Podragu Lake area again, the route today was along the ridge of some of the highest mountains in the Fagaras range. Plus the clouds on the north side of the ridge--the same fog that I'm sitting in now writing this--played off the ridges in a dramatic way. It was really breathtaking. I had to stop often and just marvel at it. Finally, I had to take long break sitting in the grass on my back pack near the top of, you guessed it, Arpasu Mare to look across to the peaks of Arpasu Mic, Buda, and several others. With the clouds moving and dancing around the peaks and the ridge line below and my vantage point of about 2460 meters, it was probably the highlight of this hiking trip. Interestingly, no one else stopped climbing to savor this view because that is everyone's halfway point in a long hiking day. And they may not know that that view is probably the best in the Fagaras. I had to set up my camera and take a picture of me at the place I had been sitting for half an hour on my bag just to remember it.

The day was intense, but not for the reason I expected. I basically changed my mind about my destination about 2 hours from Balea Lake and walked in the opposite direction, descending into the fog.

I hiked with all my gear planning to camp at either Capra Lake or Balea Lake. But after I saw the highway running to Balea Lake near the junction to head back to where I am now, Lake Pordragel, I decided that it was not worth the additional 2 hours to get to Balea Lake, which I determined on the way is the jumping off point for most Romanian day trippers doing short hikes because they can drive right up to the 2 cabanas at the lake. I was at a critical juncture, having seen the most beautiful of the range for the past 5 hours, and I looked down and saw the highway that would lead to Balea Lake through a mountain tunnel that was depicted on my map, and there was considerable traffic coming and going. Plus the trail I was on would send me down 300-400 meters before you climbed back up to 1 of the 2 passes that you have to cross to arrive at said highway. I was 5 minutes from another trail that, though it was difficult and led me back to almost where I began, was closer to where I wanted to be....as far as possible from cars.

As soon as I took that route, I never saw the sky again. I descended into a cloud, and I am in it right now as I write this. It is not windy, but it is very thick and moist...and starting to get cold as it gets darker. I set up my tent, cooked, and now am hiding from the moisture inside my tent.

Though cloudy, it did not rain today. Hopefully that will continue through the night.

If this hasn't lifted tomorrow morning, I may have to bail on the sheep herders and climb back to Pordragu and then down to Victoria the regular way...i.e., not through the land of the lost. This fog in maddening, and I can't just sit here in it waiting for it to clear for a whole other day just to allow them to cook for me....and get me a ride from the beginning of the road to the train station, which is what they said they would arrange. That would help me a lot, but wasting a day sitting in the fog would not be worth a ride. I can't in any way get down the unmarked pass into Arpasu Mare Valley in the fog. I mean, I'm a little concerned about doing it in the direct sun. It is a squirrely mountain, and I'm sure that's why no one goes that way.

Interestingly, there are no bears in the Fagaras Mountains, but there are bears in the neighboring mountains. They are attracted to the cabanas there and have been known to eat people. They ate 2 Americans recently according to Zack. The Romanian bear, Ursus, which means bear, is not very good, but it is probably better than being eaten.

After about 5 hours of hiking, I decided to change my destination to be closer to my finishing point. That led me into a fog that I thought initial would lift. Well after almost 7 hours of hiking, 2 of it in the fog, I am pitching me tent 1 hour from where I left in fog think as soup. There is not a soul around. Normally that wouldn't bother me, but this fog is erie.

While in my tent hiding from the fog, I watched Hustle and Flow on the Ipod, the first I've used the Ipod since I started the hike. Helped to pass a long night hiding from the fog.

August 18, 2008

Hiking the Transylvanian Alps: Day #6

(Matt)

It was a long night. Tent site wasn't great, uneven ground. It was the best I could do since I'm really on the side of a mountain, not in a valley. The fog comes and goes. For a few minutes, I can see the valley below out of my window, and the fog is sitting heavily in it, but I can at least see the sky and peaks above me, which is nice. But then, the cloud blows up out of the valley and covers me again like a blanket. I can tell that this fog isn't going anywhere down in the valley with my sheepherders. So I'm going to have to climb out of this valley to Podragu about 1.5 hours away and head down. It will be a long day in the fog, but I will have an actual trail. I'll try to send the shepards a text message.

I hiked out of the valley to the pass overlooking Lake Podragel to the west and Lake Podragu to the east. That pass was 2270 meters in altitude, and from there I hiked down to 500 meters in a little less than 8 hours. I was exhausted by the end. Overall, during the 6 days, I hiked 48 kilometers and climbed 2712 meters--400 meters on day 1, 800 meters meters on day 2, 670 meters on day 3, 408 meters on day 4, and 434 meters on day 5.

Finally, on the dirt road back to Victoria, I was picked up by a super nice Romanian guy who drove me all the way to the train stop and even went to look at the posted schedule to ensure that there would be a train passing to Brasov that evening. I gave him a little gas money and a grateful handshake.

On the way, we picked up a young Romanian guy named Rado, who spoke English. Turned out he was a software designer in Cluj-Napoca and had decided to hike the Fagaras, but he quit after the first day and was headed home. He was nice, and we hung out and talked for a couple hours while we were waiting for the train and then on the train to Brasov.

When I arrived in Brasov, it was about 11pm. By the time I got to the Old Town it was about midnight. I decided that I would just stop into the first hotel I saw and try to get a room. I was too tired to bargain shop at midnight, especially in Brasov where the rooms at pensions are frequently booked up. I walked into something with "palace" in the name, which is never good for a budget traveler. Sure enough, it was a 4-star hotel, and they wanted about 250 Euros for a single room. I was about to walk out when they confessed that they had a 3-star wing with a room for 80 Euros. Sold.

I cleaned up and showered and had a wonderful night's sleep.

For photos, click here: http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AatmbZk0ZtFIeY