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Published: October 5th 2017
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We took an approximately 6hr train ride to Suceava in the Bucovina region to take a tour of the painted monasteries. The countryside was flat farmland for awhile but the further north we got, the more lovely it became. (Suceava is at the very northern part of Romania, closest to Ukraine).
I mostly snoozed (my travel super power - I can sleep in any train, plane or automobile) but did wake up momentarily to hear T and my aunt play “Heads Up” (basically you have to make the other person guess something with verbal clues) in the most gloriously awkward fashion. Inaccurate clues and wild guesses were being bandied about with little success. There’s a timer in the game so we’ll chalk it up to game pressure.
The only dogs I’ve seen are strays, so of course I want to rescue allllll of them and take them home. I’m probably the only hotel guest who didn’t mind the barking outside our window late at night. Poor punkins.
The painted monasteries were on T’s wish list so I didn’t know much about them ahead of time, but I really enjoyed the tour. We wouldn’t have had any idea what
we were looking at otherwise - except that they were pretty. We saw 4 of the monasteries (UNESCO world heritage sites) in the area: Humor (the red one), Veronet (blue), Moldovita (orange) and Sucevita (green - it was the biggest one). The frescos date from the Middle Ages (or as I likes to call them - olden times) and the illustrations were to teach the bible to a predominantly illiterate congegations. The images were often laid out like comic strips. It’s amazing how well they are preserved and it’s hard to capture how impressive they are with photos. Veronet was my favourite and one fresco there our guide called it the “jeezie tree”(Jesus’ family tree).
I’m glad T had the idea to go as it wouldn’t have been something I would have chosen because of how far it is, but she’s always had a better grasp of the potential wonderfulness of an experience vs. my focus on being practical. If it weren’t for her, I know I would have missed out on some gems in the past (Mosquito Bay in Vieques or sleeping al fresco in Portugal to name just two). The monasteries would have been sad to miss.
Happy we didn’t!
The Suceava area is completely beautiful - rolling hills (the “sub-Carpathian mountains”), trees (ermagherd, I lurve trees), general gorgeousness. My favourite sights were:
1) kids playing with a donkey on their front lawn (as one would)
2) old-timey horse-drawn carts
3) sweater vests and head scarves in abundance
4) sheep grazing on the monastery grounds (I wanted to pet one, but I’m allergic to wool. And it would have been weird. The shepherd was right there).
5) Dogs (stop it, I am *not*obsessing. Well. Not much)
We spent day 10 taking the train back to Bucharest, but got demoted to 2nd class seats (boooo). It turned out the first class car was no where to be seen, but we had a comfortable enough ride back. On the trains vendors of unknown origin surreptitiously drop a bunch of goods on the seat next to you and return after a spell to see if you want to buy any (see pic).
After we got back to Bucharest, we went to the old town and I tried “mici” which is essentially a small ground meat log, crotte-like in shape and size, but very tasty. Served with mustard
- miam. Our guide from the monastery tour told us Romania was known for their soups, so we’ve had a few of those in the last few days - boletus (mushroom potage essentially) and a bunch of others: cream of tomato, mixed veggie and white bean, meatball and mom had a lamb soup she loved.
Coming up: more sightseeing and then vampires.
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