(finished hiking the trail in 2023)
Autumn on Via Transilvanica - Episode 1
The two of us - Dinu and Marlene - took the first steps on the superb 1400 km hiking trail with a legendary name - VIA TRANSILVANICA - on Saturday 9 October. 2021 leaving at 11.00 from the Putna Monastery gate. But, of course, we didn't reach Drobeta (but we will someday!), but only as far as Sovata -365 km, where we arrived on Wednesday, October 27 at 3 pm. We marched with 18-19 kg backpacks on our backs for 18 days, about 20 km/day (the record is 27 km), with a break day in the middle of the period at the good friends and club colleagues, Călin and Olga Musteață, in Bistrița Bârgăului. A break not required by our bodies long accustomed to long shifts, but necessary to wash and dry the clothes used up to that point and to visit the Doru Munteanu family from the neighborhood, in Colibița. We slept 14 nights in our dear tent, but also 4 in guesthouses or with friends!
Via Transilvanica - Terra Romana - Episode 1
Mehedinți region is a land still untrodden, in some of its places. It is that happy combination between water and rock, between the mountain peaks and the rolling curves of the vine-covered hills. Here there are still herds of sheep that, during the summer, go up to the Beletina Glade, and at the end of it go down to the villages at the foot of the Mehedinți mountains, to the shelter offered by the smallest relief unit in Romania, the Mehedinți Plateau. With emotion and pride I write, with emotion and pride I always talk about Mehedinti, regardless of whether I am in Romania or outside the borders of the country where I was born.
It seems that I am not the only one who sees something special in these places. Otherwise I don't understand why a group of beautiful people chose to make their way across these lands. In fact, it is not their path, but the path of all of us, and the people from Tășuleasa Social call this project "the road that unites". Via Transilvanica (VT) is the road that defies the rules in Romania, developing exclusively thanks to the people who really believe in it. I believe, and this text is only the first evidence of this belief.
(hiked 700 km in 2020)
Via Transilvanica: "I'm not going back, I'm just arriving"
Life seemed like a Baccalaureate of the adventures I had to go through.
The exam started with painful and muddy slopes, in which our feet got stuck, places where the sweat began on the back of the head, from the temples. It was all over that evening and the next, with boots left to dry on the boiler or with the foehn stuck deep in them. I joked with Ionuț that we had found the most welcoming period. We had already learned first hand that Bucovina is Via's touchstone; if you ride here, chances are you'll be fine even further.
(finished the trail on bicycles in 2022)
All along Via Transilvanica, day 9. "This is the whole secret: let's get to know each other"
At the end of day number nine we have crossed 500 km since we pedaled on the Via Transilvanica and we are approaching the end of Terra Siculorum – Land of the Secu. As a result of the gentler relief, we managed to cover three longer hiking segments as they are divided in the Via Transilvanica Guide. That is, the 24 km between Lupeni and Odorheiu Secuiesc, followed by the 19 km to Mărtiniș and the 30 km to Dârjiu. [...]
"The road that unites" is not a motto that just sounds good. There wasn't a day on Via Transilvanica where we didn't meet people eager for new knowledge, and this ninth day was no exception. "We are invited to the Panorama Guesthouse, the gentleman there invites us for a coffee, says that the route passes close to him", says Sergiu upon leaving Lupeni, reading a message received on Facebook.
Csaba, the one who invited us, has just returned from a five-day hike this year on the Via Transilvanica, after last year's, also five days, when he started from Putna. "Get to know us and let's get to know each other. (translated from the Romanian version of the article)
(finished hiking the trail in 2022)
Via Transilvanica, Day 41. Prisacina - Crușovâț
Once you reach Prisăcina in this divine land, it's hard to want to go further, so much beauty is everywhere. Far from civilization, we are slowly returning to our origins!
And, it wasn't too difficult for me to decide to stay there either, and so I hand over the backpack to nea Nistor, equip him properly and set it on its way! But I think, what business does he have here, how others like me also want to meet this man who runs from morning to night like a bee so that everything is perfect. I reconfigure my strategy, I console myself with the thought that I will be back soon, I also say goodbye to aunt Ioana who is like a real mother to anyone who steps on the threshold of her house and with beautiful thoughts I follow my way that there is more to come walking, as the song goes.