In the morning, we walked to the Sucevita Monastery with its impressive red and green frescoes. In our opinion, it is one of the finest of the Bucovina monasteries. Oddly enough, the western wall is incomplete. Legend has it that the artist fell from the scaffolding and no other artist dared to complete it! The last one to have been built, Sucevita is credited to Ieremia Movila (one of the few Bucovina monasteries not to be built by Stefan cel Mare). But the real treasure is the hike up the hill behind the church’s graveyard to view the monastery. It was a rare moment being able to sit for more than an hour enjoying the valley and hillsides.




We headed north to Marginea known for its black earthenware and pottery. A workshop permits visitors to see potters in process and then make purchases at the adjoining shop. As always, we were happy to have the luggage to carry a few special treasures home!




Radauti was only a brief visit for us to capture our driver’s photograph with the statue of Prince Bogdan the Great! It is a market town near the Ukrainian border. It was one of the few towns where we saw store signs advertising second-hand clothing by the kilogram (so how many kilos of jeans would you like today?).



We backtracked on the past evening’s ride through Sucevita and Vatra Moldovitei on scenic 17A enroute south to Campulung Moldovenesc. Campulung Moldovenesc is a 14th century logging town set in the Moldova Valley at 621 meters.

Our challenge was the E576 road to Vatra Dornei with its 40 kilometers of extensive construction – taking us two hours! In the midst of our frustration, we recognized the intense labor of the men who were laying wire and moving concrete blocks with their backs, mixing and pouring concrete by hand, and moving ground and digging trenches with hand tools. This scene has been common across Romania – but most striking in this area, as the spring and early summer floods had devastated much of the aging infrastructure.





Finally, we arrived into the resort town of Vatra Dornei. Vatra Dornei is a popular skiing destination for Romanians and Ukrainians. It is home to Dorna, one of Romania’s largest mineral water bottling facility (and a personal favorite).



Enroute to Lake Izvorul Muntelui south on scenic 17B, we stopped roadside for a picnic of bread, cheeses, tuna, mackerel, pufuleti (the natural Romanian alternative to the cheese puffs), and Joes (delicious cappucino wafers). With mountains surrounding the 90 kilometers drive, we were happy to see the lake after surviving very poor quality road.





Enroute to Reghin on 15, we passed through Borsec, another mineral water bottling facility. Next was the logging and aged resort town of Toplita. The route was scenic with much variety of landscape from forests to mountains to creeks alongside small villages and farms. Yet it was very poor quality road with mixtures of gravel and asphalt. With the sun setting, we arrived into Reghin, home to Romania's popular Silva beer. Of particular note, Reghin is well known for its violin factory. It is located in the Gurghiu valley because of the abundance of flamed maple (very grainy curly sycamore). –BGR & HSR