TRAVELOGUE: Walking the Carpathians, Brasov to Bran

By Stefan Korshak Jun 24, 2010, 11:09 GMT

Bran, Romania - Romania's Bucegi Mountains, where I spent the week, are a rugged region of amazing landscapes and full of contrast, just as the mercurial weather I had this week.

A jagged range rising above 2,500 metres, where the eastern and southern Carpathian Mountains intersect, they are Romania's most- visited highlands.

The mountains are an easy hour's drive from the pretty town of Brasov, and some of the heights are easily reached by cable-car, as the region is also the centre of Romania's ski industry.

I rode one cable car to evade a 600-metre climb in the summer heat, but aside from that I spent the week on foot, walking through the woods and rocky heights of the Bucegi. I crossed the range twice. There were a few day hikers and cable car riders, but otherwise it seemed I had Romania's best-known national park to myself.

The forests to the south of Brasov contain Europe's largest concentration of brown bears, according to experts, and if some news reports are to be believed, some of these animals have lost their fear of humans.

Repeatedly, as I came down off the hills, I would be asked, with some astonishment, 'Are you walking alone?'

I saw bear tracks, possibly bear claw marks on trees, and definitely bear feces. But no bears. The shepherds assured me that there were bears out there, and that walking on a well-marked trail during the day was safe. The bears would only come out at night.

At the end of the week I visited a bear reserve near the town Zarnesti, where animal protection activists have built a home for more than 40 brown bears that had spent their lives in circuses and cages.

It is Europe's largest bear refuge, and I saw dozens of them - on the opposite side of an electrified fence. The bears have a dozens of hectares to wander around in.

Much of Romania's highlands are grazed, including some meadows above 2,000 meters adjacent to Bucegi National Park. Shepherds in the highlands west of the town of Sinia gave me shelter as a thunderstorm swept in with lightning, rain and hail. Spending time in their wooden shelter, warmed by coals, was my week's high point.

The shepherds fed me with fresh cheese, cornmeal cakes and a liquor that made me forget how soaked I was. We talked of our families, automobile prices, and the World Cup. Their prediction: Brazil is the team to beat, but never, ever count out the Germans.

The next day I was less lucky, caught by a smaller storm on a higher ridge, and there were no shepherds or anyone else to help. I huddled under my poncho, waited for the rain to stop and wondered how I would find my way down off the ridge without being able to see more than 100 metres in front of me.

But I was far from the first visitor to the Bucegi Mountains, and the trails there are exceptionally well-marked, usually with a steel pole striped black and white and standing three meters tall.

I followed the markers which, according to the map, should have led me down out of the cold and fog, and they did. As I descended I caught glimpses of ornate, serrated rock formations. If the weather had been better, I might have spent the whole day taking pictures.

As before, Romanians went out of their way to help me - not just shepherds, who are famous for their mountain hospitality, but residents showing kindness to the stranger.

One couple delayed their visit to a nearby cave to drive me to a trailhead. A family stopped me on the street, as I walked dripping in the pouring rain, and offered me a roof and a bed.

I was turned away once, after 10 hours of walking, by the owner of a lodge who said she was not accepting any guests that evening. But much more typical was the young man, a physicist I met by chance, who helped me find another place to stay and then bought me a beer at the end of a long day walking.