Leaving my campsite at Camping Panorama I headed west and then south as I wanted to ride the Transfăgărășan Road, which is a road that runs through a range of mountains. The road between Cumpulung and Curtea de Arges was like a roller coaster. It was an awful road. Difficult in many places with lots of bumps and tar snakes, but damn good fun.
My front suspension was fine but the rear suspension on the Honda showed me how poor it was, bouncing all over the place. I was debating to myself about changing the rear suspension before this trip and was cursing myself that I didn’t. The Dunlop rubber was superb though, and gripped like a vice.
Eventually I joined the 7C road and started heading north. The first 10 miles are just normal, pretty houses and some curving roads, then all of a sudden it starts. The bends. All 40 miles of them… And quite soon I saw my first bear begging at the side of the road, just like one of those chaps who cleans your windows at traffic lights. And then I kept seeing more and more. Again, loitering at the side of the road waiting for food. It’s quite sad that they’ve become so dependent on people in campervans and cars stopping to give them food.
Eventually you arrive at a very large lake high in the mountains with a huge dam at the southern end. For most of the road it’s just bend after bend with trees either side, so there’s not much to see – until you get about ⅔ of the way when you start climbing, and climbing and climbing. Eventually you go into a tunnel and then pop out at the top of the mountain – in cloud. It was like being in a zombie movie where the fog rolls-in. After that you just go down, down and down, with bend after bend on roads which are slick with moisture – until the cloud cleared and I saw sunlight and dry roads again.
Soon after it was back to normal roads. I had to pull over and stop for a while as the adrenaline was still pumping and I felt quite giddy. It was one heck of a ride and I felt like turning around and then doing it all again, but, time waits for no man so I need to keep heading north. My biggest regret is in not taking more pictures. I was so hooked-in to riding the road that I forgot to take more pictures. Maybe next year…
Back on the bike I started to munch the miles in a northerly direction. Up ahead the sky was getting darker and darker, so I stopped to put my waterproofs on. I’m glad I did as the rain was biblical. After a ride of around 380 to 400km I arrived at my campsite. This coincided with a small break in the rain which was long enough to get my tent up and all my kit sorted – before the rain came back with a vengeance.
I’m staying at Camping Cheile Turzii, which is about 10km west of Turda, and the campsite is really good. It’s £10 a night, which includes a kitchen to cook your food, a communal lounge and lots of greenery surrounding the campsite. The campsite is almost full, mostly Romanian and Czech. My only grumble is that there’s no 4G coverage and the WiFi on the camp is so slow.
