Returning to Rimet

 On Monday the 19th of August Martin picked us up from Sibiu and took us back to Rimet. But before we left the city we stopped off at a 1 lei store, a place that Martin knew well as he loves searching for cheap finds in weird places. It was good fun rummaging threw the piles of clothes, I picked out a nice jacket and pair of jorts, of course 1 lei each, which is about 33 pence. Martin collected 4 sparkly shirts that he claimed was our knew archaeology uniform, that we would later surprise Monica whilst wearing. We did the 1 and a half journey back but instead of going up into the mountains to Rimet, where Casa Victoria is, we went into the valley below to stay in a village called, Geoagiu de Sus, quite famous for its monastery. 

We stayed in a lovely property called Casa Butnarului, so check it out if you ever want to stay in the mountains of Transylvania, or Casa Victoria for that matter. Monica's foundation is called Satul Verde, look it up! The rest of the week we travelled up to Casa Victoria each day, me being the only one with a licence meant I drove the dodgy Zafira through the mountain tracks and up to the farm. I had a great time! Our task on the farm was to survey each building: the family house, kitchen, wardrobe, large barn, donkey barn, and pigsty, photograph them, learn about the places history and the skills that went into to sustaining a place like this, and put it into a booklet that Monica could use. We wanted to learn of the almost 100% sustainable lifestyle that has produced a fruitful existence for the inhabitants of the area for many generations. This was important to Monica as globalisation has inevitably drawn many young people away from their family homes and into the cities, or abroad, leaving the heritage of the many previous generations to be dying before our very eyes. This was why we were making the booklet in attempt to contribute to maintaining this and possibly help get Casa Victoria its recognition of Heritage to then be protected as tangible culture. 

The Saturday of the 24th, Martin took us on a brilliant road trip. We set off in the morning for the bison reserve, where there was a reintroduction program for forest bison to support re wilding of the country. I had never seen bison before and was amazing to see them here, they had been completely driven from the wild here and have unique impacts on the ecosystem, including making pathways through the trees. The next stop was a Roman site, it was huge and was supposedly the capital of the area during the Roman occupation, holding thousands of people. The third and final stop was Castelul Corvinilor, or Hunedoara Castle, originally built by John of Hunedoara who was a military leader who led the Romanians/Hungarians to victory against the Ottoman Empire. He became governor of the country and this spectacular castle was built in 1453. It is a picture perfect image of a classic Transylvanian vampire's castle, but I shouldn't say that. No wonder it is such a popular tourist attraction, there were 2 weddings there whilst we visited for about 2 hours. I drove back and we stopped in Alba Iulia for a lovely meal together before going back to the house. 

On Sunday we drove to Rimet Monastery, this is definitely worth a visit, it sits below two huge ridges in the mountain where the valley follows into the gap. The buildings were beautiful inside and out, it was very peaceful and was nice to see the nuns sat outside there homes reading and watching. This is a very famous monastery and the roads still get packed every Sunday for visitors from all around. We left and continued on towards the gorge, as we wanted to do the popular walk. Again the road got dodgier and we weren't sure where to stop, but I followed another car and we eventually got there. It was really busy with people walking both ways on the slippery rocks along the sides of the river, it was quite tricky at points with metal rails and ropes connected the gorge walls to climb along so you didn't fall in the water. This didn't stop there being kids and even toddlers completing this, not to mention to OAPs! We did the whole thing which must have been a couple of miles, then went up the side of the mountain a little to get a brilliant view. Many people continued a hike into the mountains, which I really wanted to do but we had to get back and work. We didn't bother doing the trek back properly, so we waded through the river. I found it quite fun but I don't think the girls were so happy, especially Lauren in her skirt and Converses!