The Road to Hell

Rolling down from Kiralyhago was quicker than I thought - and yet again I was on a major highway, with no intention of staying there. The previous day, I said I took a wrong turn, as I heard from multiple folks that the road I forsake was a spectacular one. Instead of backtracking, I went for a parallel road, going south. First, it wad the town of Remeti I went to, where I saw a tiny little barber's shop, where I got a hair-cut for 10 Lei (Eur 2,50...the cheapest one I've had in ages 😉). Then I found a brand new hotel, where I stopped for a rather frugal breakfast - so I asked for a second serving.

You see, what was ahead of me was Value Iadului, or Hell's Canyon. It was really nice, following a river, the only catch was, make that two, that is was 50 km uphill (which is bad enough) and on a road of pathetic quality. I am not sure 'road' is the right name, maybe we should settle for 'track' or something. It ran next to a river, which sometimes became a torrent, it was quite spectacular. Took me ages to reach the summit - by the time I did, it started raining...

...but only for a few minutes (when I was heading downhill). By then, I had reached the town of Beius (Beles), which was actually further west then I had started, so I did back-track somewhat. I did not stop there, but continued towards the east, through some tiny little villages, where people were sitting outside their houses, chatting; then came a honking car convoy of a marriage, so life was going on in the sunny Saturday evening.

I reached Pietroasa, with a huge whole in my stomach, as there was no real restaurant there, I went to the first grocery store and bought some great burek, filled with goat cheese and flushed it down with some yoghurt. Not sure it was the best combination, but it did the trick.

Yet again uphill, I entered the Apunesi National Park, where I found a very nice hotel for less than Eur 20. There was the Romanian soccer cup final on TV, but having covered around 130 kilometers (many of these unpaved) that day, I dozed off almost immediately.