Don't believe the blogs and vlogs; Moldova is great

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We spent new year’s eve in Kiev a few years ago, also visiting Chernobyl and Lviv (Chernobyl for New Year darling?). Little did we know at the time that it would be the last opportunity to safely visit Ukraine for a while. Given Putin’s imperialistic ambitions, we – perhaps overly pessimistically – thought that we ought to get to Moldova fairly soon with the war just over its border and the Russian military bases on Moldovan soil in the self-declared independent Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR). Moldova’s president Maia Sandu’s very openly pro-EU stance is also angering Russia, thus, while we were in Romania we thought it prescient to visit Moldova as well. However, rather than recommending people to pop in if you find yourself in Romania, we now think Moldova warrants a whole holiday in itself – we really enjoyed it.





I’m quite partial to a country highpoint, for reasons of them being challenge (e.g. Uganda/DR Congo (Learning To Walk On Water - The Rwenzori Mountains) and Armenia (A Summer Stroll up Mount Aragats)) or just an excuse to visit a random part of the country that turns out to be unexpectedly interesting (e.g. Palau (Paradise Found) and Malta (Little but Very Likeable)). Moldova’s Bălănești Hill was definitely the latter. Because we were driving into Moldova from Iași, Romania’s second city, I knew that it was only a minor detour off the road to Chişinău to go to Bălănești. And I’d read it was tricky to get there by public transport, but we were driving. I successfully convinced the others it was a good idea once we had navigated the border crossing – which had a slight delay as we had to prove Andrej had permission to take his company car over the border. Fortunately, the owner of the company is his dad and we soon, while we parked in the way of all the border-crossing lorries, had his dad’s secretary email us the required permission. Internet information on Bălănești Hill is sparse and outdated. There is now a map in Bălănești village and signs pointing up the right tracks for the hour-ish and 4 km round trip to the top. There is also now a cross on the “summit”, rather than relying on stumbling across the high point within the flattish area between an old radio mast and a newer mobile phone mast. While the view is nice, it’s just a little hill of 430 metres. The pleasure comes from wandering through a quiet Moldovan village, chatting to locals (thus it’s handy if you are with Romanian pals), then walking across flower-filled meadows, and eating abundant roadside fruits on the way down; think delicious mulberries, damsons, various types of cherries, and others for which I don’t know if there is an English name. It seems some foreign development agencies have realised the attraction of a country highpoint and have put in information boards and signs; none of this existed at the time of all the travelblogs we read – they had all struggled to find the way up. We could actually have extended the walk much further along marked paths and I would have really liked to.



Walking or driving through rural Moldova was really pleasant. There is traditional colour theme to the houses and gates, a kind of turquoise blue and pale green (it may be very different to that as I am quite colour blind), which is really endearing. The nicely painted and decorated wells everywhere are also especially attractive for all of us (not very many) hydrogeologists.



Our Romanian pals, who come from only ten or so kilometres from the Moldovan border but had never visited, were expecting Chişinău to be like Bucharest ten years ago. They freely admitted, and I have to agree, that it is the other way around and Bucharest has some way to go to catch up. Yes there are plenty of ugly Soviet apartment blocks but when you get into the centre, especially along the Stefan cel Mare si Sfant Boulevard, it’s really attractive. There are wide tree-lined pavements, old theatres and government buildings, lots of leafy squares and parks, and it is spotlessly clean – if you stay up late you’ll see the little machines that steam-clean the pavements and jet-wash the bus shelters. There’s quite a bit of construction going on to jazz up the adjacent streets too so if you leave it a few months it'll be even nicer. There are pavement cafes, nice restaurants and some cool clothes shops where Magdalena found two really nice dresses, but I was disappointed not to come across an FC Zimbru Chișinău shirt, not even in the huge market.



When you Google Moldova travel itineraries, not a lot comes up. But Old Orhei is always there. Indeed, the most often used photo on any Moldovan tourism literature or website (and the title picture of this blog) seems to be the view of the sweeping bend in the Răut River backed by cliffs (in which you can just make out cave monasteries and chapels) on top of which stands the “Monastery of The Nativity of The Mother of God”. We only appreciated when we got there that there is actually a lot more to do in the area. As with Bălănești Hill, some international donors have paid for information boards, footpath markers, signs and a car park with very nice toilets. We followed one of the marked paths for a pleasant stroll along the river, crossing a rickety bridge and entering Butuceni village from the back. There are lots of traditional houses now converted into museums, all of which were closed for lunch when we passed! The orthodox church at the monastery is worth a look but the highlight is the view; as you can see from the number of photos from there that I have included in this blog. The cave monastery is easy to miss – enter under the little belltower – and is pretty cool, especially because you can get out onto a cliff ledge through the back. Round and about there are ruins of a caravanserai, a mosque, Tatar baths, a fortress – you really have to use your imagination with some of them but it means you could easily spend the day in the area if you link them all together via the footpaths (presuming the under-construction cafes are open by now).



We went from Old Orhei to Cricova Winery. This is what I knew of Moldova from a tourism perspective before researching the trip, of the presence of extensive wine tunnels rich in stories as well as very good wine. It is Cricova where Yuri Gagarin got lost for two days, emerging quite worse for wear, and where Vladimir Putin celebrated his 50^th birthday. Despite Cricova having 120 km of tunnels, it is not actually the biggest in the country; that accolade goes to Mileștii Mici with 200 km of cellars. To visit Cricova Winery you have to book a tour where a little train takes you into the tunnels that were carved out for the limestone (it is still an active limestone quarry so it may yet become the biggest!). Make sure you dress fairly warmly as it’s a constant ~12C inside as you are around 100 metres underground. The tunnels are filled with barrels, tanks and well over a million bottles of rare wine; Moldova’s currency is actually founded on wine rather than gold reserves like most countries of the world. The train takes you through these tunnels until you eventually reach corridors and corridors filled with thousands of bottles of sparkling wine on angled racks that are rotated by hand (35000 per day!) – this is the classical method of making sparkling wine invented by the monk Dom Pierre Perignon. After seeing the galleries where lots of current or former world leaders maintain a collection (such as Angela Merkel, Joe Biden, Lukashenko, Putin and … Hermann Goering!), we did a tasting in one of the grand tasting rooms. It is the varieties of sparkling wine that we rated the highest; these are also the most award winning. Our guide Natalja was great, who gradually switched from delivering the standard scripted information during the tour to going more and more off-script during the tasting. After finishing all the cheese and the 6 or 7 varieties of wine (and the wine of some other guests who weren’t as keen on it as we were) we all left the tunnels not exactly walking in a straight line. The car was left at the winery and we caught the bus back to Chişinău!



We then had a couple of days in Transnistria, but that will be the subject of the next blog, it being – in the eyes of the local population – the independent Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR).



In planning this Moldova of the trip, we read quite a few travel blogs and watched a few youtube videos. Moldova is nothing like what they lead you to believe. People searching for hits and likes will have you believe that Europe’s least visited and poorest country is a dilapidated dump, miserably clinging on to its Soviet past. Nope, as you can see from the photos, it’s really nice.

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Photos

The Triumphal Arch in front of the Metropolitan Cathedral, Chişinău
It commemorates the victory of the Russian Empire against Turkey in the Russo-Turkish War of 1828-29.

The Triumphal Arch in front of the Government House of Moldova, Chişinău
Note the train carriages commemorating the forced deportations during Soviet times - quite a statement infront of the EU flag.

Ștefan cel Mare (Stephen the Great) monument, Chişinău
Moldovan and Romanian hero for various wars and lengthy peace.