Romania: Summer Vacation 2022 - Day 4: Exploring Apuseni
Our main destination for this year's summer vacation was
Romania and after we spend the night in
Apuseni mountains, it was time to explore them. From our campsite Poiana Glavoi we hiked to a meadow Poiana Ponor, which is a closed
depression surrounded by high, partially forested peaks and the water drains from it through the
sinkholes. We continued to Lumea Pierduta (The Lost World), where we found another 4 sinkholes. After we explored the area, we returned back to our campsite, packed everything up and we moved on. We wanted to continue west, but the road became too bad for our Angie, so we turned around and planed a new route. On our way were the waterfall Cascada Bulbuci, where we did another short hike. Our visit to Apuseni was over, so we just drove to
Alba Iulia, where we spend the night.
Previous days of our Summer Vacation 2022: Day 3 -
15780, Day 2 -
15779, Day 1 -
15778.
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| Eggs for breakfast. |
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| A meadow and a depression called Poiana Ponor. When the snow is melting, the sinkholes hardly drain the water, so we can have a nice lake here. |
Bronco spotted some dogs, guarding the sheep, while Nada and me observed the signpost.
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| Flora and fauna. |
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| Bronco is not a big fan of water. |
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| Cliffs on the Southeast side of the Poiana Ponor. |
After a short break, we continued to an area called The Lost World - Lumea Pierduta.
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| Nada and Bronco. |
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| We chose to go right at the signpost, making our way to Gemănata Sinkhole (Avenul Gemănata). It has a depth of over 100 meters and 20 meters in diameter and it has a small, narrow limestone bridge that unites the edges. The underground river that flows through it goes all the way to the Black Sinkhole (Avenul Gemănata), our next destination. |
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| Bronco wanted a new companion, but he was to slow to come along. |
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| The name Lost World started to make sense. |
The third sinkhole that we visited was the Pionierilor, a small 9 meters wide by 9 meters deep hole.
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| The last sinkhole, that we visited, was the Covered Sinkhole (Avenul Acoperit) that looks more like a cavern. |
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| We finished the circle trail on Lumea Pierduta with another look at the Gemănata Sinkhole (Avenul Gemănata). |
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| Crossing the creek and waiting for something spectacular to happen. Well, we weren't that lucky. |
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| Back over the Poiana Ponor meadow. |
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| For now, there are only a few huts at this nice campsite. Hopefully it will remain like this. |
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| We left our campsite and on the way we spotted a nice workshop. |
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| Since the time of the Romans, the fame of the gold in the Apuseni Mountains has been a special attraction. Gradually, over time, until today, the color of gold turned into the green of the forests and pastures that cover the mountains, into the blue of the lakes and rivers with splendid waterfalls, into the white of the limestones that formed some of the most important karst phenomena in Europe and in the red-orange of the mysterious and romantic sunsets that gave the name of these mountains, the Apuseni Mountains - the Sunset Mountains |
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| The road was getting worse and worse, so we stopped one of the cars and they told us, that it is better to turn around with a car like our Angie. And so we changed our plans a little. |
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| Nada, Bronco and Tuši on the way to Cascada Bulbuci. |
The upper waterfall.
Bulbuci waterfall is located into a beautiful natural surroundings, on the valley of the same name, left tributary of Boga Valley. Soon Bronco and me located rappelling carabiners and we immediately knew, that there should be one more waterfall below us, so we decided to explore further.  |
| We were correct as the sign soon revealed itself. |
The lower Bulbuci Waterfall (which actually translates to Globeflower) is around 20 meters high.
As I found out later, the waterfall has 3 sections, therefore in Hungarian it is called Három Királyok, namely, Three Kings' Falls.  |
| Slippery rocks or just improper equipment. |
We said goodbye to the waterfalls (Garmin Connect) and headed to Alba Iulia, where we booked an apartment.
Geocaches found (all received a visit by trackable item "Magic: The Gathering, Rivals of Ixalan Trackable: Vampire Die Bonbon Dose",
TB8Q8AY):
- Geminate Doline, EarthCache,
GC8Z1C3
