The most famous of Romania's "Painted Monasteries" Romania's "Painted Monasteries" are UNESCO World Heritage monuments. Perhaps the most famous and stunning of the painted monasteries is Voronet. Widely known throughout Europe as "the Sistine Chapel of the East" due to its interior and exterior wall paintings, this monastery offers an abundance of frescoes featuring an intense shade of blue commonly known as ‘Voronet blue.’ The composition of the paint continues to remain a mystery even now, more than 500 years after the church was built. Voronet Monastery was founded [View Full Entry]

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The northern part of Romania is home to painted monasteries from the 14th and 15th centuries. The monasteries of Bucovina, near Suceava, were beautiful. It was incredible to witness the vibrancy of the frescoes both inside and outside the churches. The details are still intact and in some cases appear to have been painted within the last 100 years rather than during the 14th century. Monica was a great tour guide and keeps a lovely hostel in Suceava which she cares for and continually beautifies with her green thumb. She even traded plants with the nuns at a couple of the [View Full Entry]

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Went on a tour to the 4 painted monastaries in Moldovia....and today is St. Elijah's day!..big thing for the Orthodox.. They are very nice! There are paintings from the outside to the inside.. Using plants..painted on plaster.....Surprised how long they last actually!! These are all very old! They have many Christian stories painted on it and some are even in unique Romanian style!! The hostel I was in the owner was ta licenced guide so she gave us a lot of information about them!!! Very interesting and I learned a lot more about Christianity indeed! Each of these Unesco Monastaries [View Full Entry]

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Suceava, the captial of the moldvia county... its big! but the part I am in is SO laid back!!!! The hostel is very nice!, its in the outskirts, but easily accessible. Farms and very friendly people around! They have cows and chickens in their little farm here and have fresh milk and eggs everyday!!!!!! YUM!! I arrived today and they served me breakfast as well!!! So nice!!!!!! They make Romanian dinners here...traditional kind! was watching the girl make it today....ying!!!! so wanna eat...its 25 lei though...kinda expensive...but I think I will have it...just to give myself a little [View Full Entry]

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From the Maramures we went over the mountains to Southern Bucovina, where there are a number of painted monastries. Weve read the monastries are a few hundred years old, all on the UNESCO world heritage list and have gorey paintings of stories from the old testament on the inside and outside walls. We´ve been enjoying our time in Romania so much that this was certainly good enough an excuse for us to go to explore another region of the country... Due to the lack of tourists up here, there are again no campsites in this region. Since weve been told you [View Full Entry]

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In the morning their offsider arrived and she spoke good English, sorted out money and things. I was going to go for a walk around but didn’t get to it, just checked my email. Couldn’t see the big dog that they had, well I assume he was big going by the barking he had been doing last night when I turned up. Before I had left Australia Monica has said to make sure I had some warm clothes and good shoes as it was minus 15 the night before and they had a foot of snow. Well not today… yes it [View Full Entry]

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It seems that I exist in a time vacuum, having no concept of the days of the week, or the uncanny ability that time has to fly by. Really it's unbelievable to me that it is now August, another month is gone, and another country awaits. However, the next stop will not be reached without a considerable amount of suffering as my train trip from where I am now in Suceava, Romania to Kiev, Ukraine will take me roughly 23 hours. I can't say that I'm very much looking forward to this one, especially considering the last few trips I've taken [View Full Entry]

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