The Transfăgărășan Road

Wednesday 4^th of July



Eilen oli aivan huikee päivä!
Yesterday was by far one of the best days on my trip so far, if not the best.



Fun facts of Tuesday:
Route: Sibiu - Transfagarasan road – Curtea de Arges – Brasov – Sighisoara - Sibiu
Staring from hostel: 10 AM
Back to hostel: 3.30 AM
Total distance travelled: 552 km
Total time spent in car: 11 hours
Average Speed: 50km/h
Highest point by car: 2000 m
Highest point by foot: 2400 m
Feelings after the day: Very tired but super good!



We started our mini road trip at 10 am from the hostel with our rental Fiat Punto, heading straight to the mountains. Two Finnish medical students from Turku, Tanita and Henriina, who happened to be in the same hostel came with me. We didn't need to drive for too long before we reached the Transfagarasan Road. It's absolutely amazing. The beautiful road climbs up to the mountain and to Balea Lake, after numeous S-curves and accelerations. I can't describe it, see yourself from the pictures. ;) Anyways, after reaching the lake and having a lunch in an amazing spot, we decided to climb even higher by foot. After half an hour of climbing we found a huge herd of mountain goats (or whatever they officialliy are) from our path. We tried to continue, but the dog leading the herd didn't want to let us go. And we didn't want to get bitten by a dog, so we took a small detour. First it was ok, but at some point it got really difficult, and in the end it was real mountain climbing. Fortunetaly no one got hurt and we reached the peak in the end, even though it didn't look very good at some point. Luckily the girls proved themselves to be real climbers. ;) The view from the top was also worth every effort.



In the end our little hike took us four hours, and then started the long drive back. After coming down from the mountain we felt like driving in Finland because of the wonderful lake views (ok, I'll admit, in Finland there wouldn't be the mountains in the back...). We also crossed a huge dam, and after it dozens of small villages. The funny (?) thing about the villages were, that the ”highway” was at the same time the main street of each village, meaning that all the houses were right next to the road. So if you managed to avoid all small kids playing on the road, you still had to watch out for the horses, cows, dogs and chickens. Of course not to mention the holes in the road. And because the road was the ”highway” at the same time, cars and trucks drive very fast all the time. I wonder how many accidents must happen every year. In one village one big truck had fallen partly to the ditch. Probably took some time from the villagers to get it up from there... then again, probably it wasn't the first accident. But it was very fascinating to see all these villages. The average speed of the day was in the end very low, so it took us a long time. I left the girls in Sighisoara maybe after 1 am, and finally returned to Sibiu after 3 am, feeling very tired but at the same time super excited after the amazing day. At the moment I would say that was one of the coolest places I've ever been to...