Moldova for Christmas - Wine Cave, Church Cave, and Food!

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Christmas day was set to be busy. And fun!!! We had another great breakfast before taking off in our bus. I think I should explain two of my companions, though I think I did in another blog. When I saw my family back in Sweden a month before, my niece and nephew gave me two of their precious squishmellows to hold onto until I next saw them (they did have ulterior motives as they wanted me to buy them something and gave up their squishmellows to save the space in their luggage). So, I decided to give Perry and Bernardo an adventure - my Moldova group was totally on board, so they had a nice time as well.

Milestii Mici

The drive to Milestii Mici was about 45 minutes and we arrived just as it opened. This was the main reason I joined this trip: wine tasting, cycling, in a cave. The trifecta! We were greeted by our winery guide, who led us to the buses and bicycles. Unfortunately, there were only 6 bikes available, so we would have to share. And it was going to be just a short route of about 4-5 km total through the caves, whereas I had imagined a morning of cycling. Regardless, it was fun! I was able to put Perry and Bernardo in the bike basket and we enjoyed a leisurely pedal through the cool, dark caves. We had a couple of stops where our guide explained some of the wine making process and storage in vats / barrels or the discussion of the many twists and turns of the underground roads. There are about 200 km of tunnels, 55km currently in use, and they maintain a constant temperature of about 12-14 degrees Celsius with high humidity, making it ideal conditions for wine storage. It is currently the largest wine storage cellar in the world with over 2 million bottles, many of which have been aged for decades. They are mostly red, with some whites and some dessert wines.

After a bit, we finally made it to the tasting room, which is essentially a large restaurant area. The entrance to the tasting room was through two large doors made of barrel halves. And we were all sat at a large table, each of us having some small food samples (bread slices with deli meat and cheeses and eggplant mainly). Plus we each had three glasses of wine - not so much a tasting, but a flight of wines. They were all good, even the super sweet dessert wine. i personally liked the white wine the most, but I wound up buying the red. So, we made our way back to the entrance - this was a much shorter wine tasting day than I had imagined, but still nice. I was able to claim my bike again as a few people opted to not ride at all, so that made me happy. As said, I purchased a bottle and others purchased a few, some of which we enjoyed on our bus ride to the next destination.

Old Orhei Cave Monastery

Our next stop was to visit a cave church, found within an old town, where one old monk has lived for the past 19 years, a former acquaintance of Natalia. She told us his story, that he came up here for solitude after the death of his wife, but he had a daughter who is married to a priest. I could not help but laugh when one girl said "and his daughter was ok with that? Like, ok, I'm just gonna go live in a cave for the rest of my life?" Definitely a different perspective. Natalia was worried about the inebriation of some of our group and heavily warned us to take care and maybe to not even chance the short hike up as it was extremely steep. We all went anyway. The hike itself was fine, but I fell when we first entered the cave to go down to the church area - the floor was uneven and of course i stepped into a hole and twisted around. Every frigging time. But when you go through the chapel area out the back side, you have amazing views of the river valley below and it is indeed a drop off with a narrow walkway. We stayed a few minutes to get photos, everyone pretty much holding onto each other just in case. We went back through the chapel and admired the scenery above. I walked a bit to the top while waiting for everyone and got some photos above the chapel along the ridge. Breathtaking.

Christmas Dinner

Our last stop of the day was a boutique hotel nearby, Valea Stancii, where we sat to eat a lovely traditional Christmas dinner. Everything was delicious. I seriously was hurting the rest of the night because I was just so, so, so full! The mulled wine was yum and served in a beautiful pitcher (I do wish I had bought one similar). There was a dish containing eggplant with garlic - its name in Moldovan means "tongue of mother-in-law" because it is so spicy. There were also savory pastries with cheese and spinach, chicken, bean soup, polenta, and a cool fruit drink. Just all so good!

At the end of the meal, some local teenagers came to sing us traditional christmas songs - one of the boys was someone Natalia used to babysit! They were so sweet though it was just a short presentation. The people who ran the hotel were also super friendly, though quiet. The room we were in was cozy - warm and with some relaxing chairs and sofas to settle on. After dinner, it was time for a long ride back to our hotel - some people went out again. Not me.

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Comments

[D MJ Binkley]

Wow
Now that is a meal. I understand why you were full!