On to Romania

Blog post #800 finds us in Sucovita, northern Rumania, Moldavia, seeing our third "painted" monastery in a day, and parking in its visitor parking lot, not far from a restaurant with wifi. We finally got the needed new tires in Budapest, at a place called Automax. So far, so good. We drove on, after stocking up at the nearby Tesco, into Romania. At the border they stamped our passports, noting we were in a motor vehicle. (We'd better be in a motor vehicle when we leave!) We also bought the required vignette for travel on Romanian highways, about $30 for a month. We stopped a bit past Oradea, an unattrative Soviet-bloc industrial town, at a restaurant that offered free parking. A beer brought access to wifi too. The next day we drove on into the Marmures, the mountainous northern region, just south of Ukraine, famous for its wooden churches and continuing peasant life. Below are some scenes from the road...

Our first night in Romania; northern Romania has few--

possibly no--campgrounds; fortunately, wild camping is

tolerated; especially if you clear it with the proprietors and

buy a beer or dinner

Alas, it was only the next morning that we discovered we

had parked nearby a business that traffics in the gnome cult;

the gnome cult knows no boundaries, no borders

Romanians are renowned as the worst drivers in Europe,

the highest accident rate and the highest mortality rate;

despite the fact few own cars; here's the third auto junk

yard we saw the next morning, nearly all the wrecks

front-enders; this was the best-organized junk dealer I

have seen...

These are Romanian hay-stacks, all organized around

central poles; we have dubbed them "Vlad the Impaler"

style; we have seen tens of thousands more in the last

few days

Hotel Montana

Isvorul Crisului, aka "Souvenir Village" a

little town approaching the Marmures that

is lined, both sides, with little tourist

trinket shops

Goes on perhaps a mile or more; one of the things we have

learned is that, at least in this region, all the villages and

town go on a mile or more, generally more, since they

simply line the highway, with no side-streets or

off-shoots; this means you'll have a 3-mile village,

followed by, another 1000 feet, another 3-mile village;

consequently, if you abide by the laws, going is very

slow, in our case, averaging about 35 mph; we are clearly

the only vehicle in Romania that abides by the laws; these

people will pass you going uphill on a blind curve, in rain,

in areas congested not only by other cars but also horse-

drawn wagons, bicycles, pedestrians; we are driving very

defensively

We expected to see horse-drawn wagons occasionally;

they are everywhere, even in some of the cities

Ditto

Entering Cluj Napoca, another big city, not

attractive to our eyes

Back out in the countryside, nearly every

house has a painted metal Jesus

Ditto; the painted metal Jesus business must

be very good

Miscellaneous Budapest

A few more pix from Budapest, which we have enjoyed immensely.

We stayed at Camping Haller, virtually downtown Pest, a

couple tram stops from the Danube; free showers, free wifi,

every 4th night free; free washers, but no dryers (which

gave me the opportunity to walk some distance through

the working-class neighborhoods--twice--to the laundromat)

Subway sign for hi-def TV (we think); still processing this

one...but you can see how difficult it is for us to follow

anything in the language

Non-conformist hotel

A wall near the Castle; the Russians besieged Budapest for

some months in 1944; the bullet and shell holes here were

preserved...

Eastern-bloc T-bird

"Oh, shit! Where's my arrow?!"

Much later: we bought this train for Penelope in Budapest
at a store called Two TeddyBears Toygallery (Ket Macko
Jatekgaleria) 

Europe's Oldest Underground Railroad

Another part of the interest of Andrassy Ut is that below it runs Europe's oldest underground railway--subway--still Budapest's line #1

It's only 15 feet beneath the boulevard

Heroes' Square station

Interior--everything down-scaled

Tiny little cars (by contemporary standards)

Leather straps to hang on to, just like in the olden days

Two tiny little cars; but a treat to see and ride!

PS:  In our eight days in Budapest, we have ridden a variety of buses, trams, and subways, all over town, sometimes 6 or 8 in a day. It's a very good transportation system. The most remarkable thing, however, is that here, unlike every other city we have visited, the locals unfailingly offer you their seat, no matter whether it's a long haul or short. Vicki never had to stand on any of our (sometimes long) rides. I have no idea whether it's a senior thing or a visitor thing or a gender thing, but Budapest residents have it perfected.

Andrassy Utca

We spent Wednesday mostly on skype and email, frantically trying to track down tires for the Grey Wanderer. It's a size (previous post) that is apparently unusual in Europe. At length, we think we have found some, here in Budapest, through Automax.hu. We'll see; Friday morning. Thursday we lazed around, eventually tramming into town for a Hungarian lunch at Stex's (again; we like this place), and a promenade of Andrassy Ut, Pest's great northeastern boulevard. It's an old-style tree-lined boulevard, many great buildings to look at (but rather little in the way of shops and restaurants), ending at Heroes' Square and the park and spa beyond.

On the way is the House of Terror, now a museum, but

earlier the headquarters of the Hungarian secret police

It's exterior walls are lined with names and

photographs of the scores murdered within,

particularly after the uprising in 1957

Along the way, too, are many beautiful but now delapitated

buildings, awaiting renovation; this appears common in

eastern bloc countries; the problem is not so much funding

as ownership and clear title; after fifty years of turmoil in

these countries, the Germans, then the Russians, war,

genocide, and then communism, matters of ownership can

be quite obscure



Andrassy Ut, looking northeast to Heroes'

Square



Heroes' Square (1896); which celebrates--I am sure you are

aware--the millennial anniversary of the Magyar conquest

of the Carpathian Basin (did I skip that chapter in my

western civ course?!); lots of things here, including the

central market, were built in 1896, sort of a high-water

mark in the Austro-Hungarian Empire

Main part of Vajdahunyad Castle, in the park just up from

Heroes' Square

Wider view of Vadjahunyad Castle (lots of renovation

here), which includes Baroque, Romanesque, Gothic, and

Tudor styles (what? no Moorish Revival?!)

Back downtown, another beautiful building

And we ended our long stroll with another stop at the

central market for some tokay, paprika, etc.

Gellert Baths; and Stex

Pretty much all of Hungary is a thermal area, and Budapest is famous for, among other things, its thermal baths. August 31st being the second anniversary of our retirement travels, we celebrated by going to the Gellert Baths (close to our campground; indoors--the weather has turned cool and wet) and then to the Stex restaurant on Jozsef Utca for a great Hungarian dinner.

The grand old Gellert Hotel, the Gellert Baths within

The main pool area

The men's thermal area (sorry, Vicki did not have the camera for the women's)

Interior decor

Ceiling

Dome

Another beautiful but, sadly, unidentified building, in Pest (near Joszef) [later
identified as the Museum of Applied Arts...thanks, Zsuzsa!]

The Stex retaurant; if you come to Budapest, don't miss it; large, evidently very 
popular with the locals, great Hungarian food; not outrageously expensive; not 
even expensive, really: we had appetizers, drinks, and the Stex dinner for two 
(steak (grilled), chicken (kiev), pork (schnitzel), with frites and riz, $30

Alas, we were so taken by the place, we forgot to take pix of anything but the 
appetizer/soups, Vicki's cold peach/almond, and my hot goulash; um, yum

Many more distinguished (or pretentious) restaurants will 
have a word about themselves on the menu; this is Stex's; 
it is a hoot, all about the founder and what a rascal he was 
(a gambler, in Las Vegas among other places...); does not 
even mention the restaurant!

Budapest by Night

A few night shots taken after the Rajko performance from our tram stop, waiting for the ride back Haller Utca, and #24 to our campground

Matthias Church, Fisherman's Bastion, etc., across the river

(from our tram stop)

The Castle and Chain Bridge

Castle closer-up

(Not the) Budapest Opera, in Pest (so I was later informed)

Liberty, again

Rajko Folk Ensemble

That evening, after a good Hungarian pizza dinner, we stayed in downtown Pest for a program of Hungarian/Gypsy folk music and dancing, by the Rajko Folk Ensemble. Granted, it's a touristy sort of thing, and occurred in a beautiful little Rococco (!) theatre (shells and cherubim everywhere), but the music--partly classics (Lizst, Brahms), partly traditional and Gypsy--was electrifying, as was the dancing. The orchestra consisted of nine violins, a clarinet, a bass, and a cimbalom. I have never heard anyone get more out of a violin than these folks--nor clarinet, nor bass--and, until that evening, I had never seen anyone play the cimbalom.  Interestingly, particularly in the Gypsy pieces (they spell it Gipsy, FWIW), I thought I heard some elements of Bartok, who was a student of Hungarian folk music. Anyhow, it was a great experience.

Applause after one of the dances

This guy was the leader of the band and did incredible things with the fiddle

More dancin', more fiddlin'

Ditto

And dancin'

Curtain call