Day 8: Michalovce – Bucharest

My friends, what a ride! To be as faithful as words permit to the “real thing”, this post will have to be proportional to our journey, meaning especially long, even for my standards. To try to make it more “reader friendly”, I’ll structure it in 3 parts: Ukrainian border; Slovakia and Hungary and finally Romania.

Ukrainian Border
Our original plans didn’t include any detour through Ukraine. But neither did they include going as east in Slovakia as Michalovce. As soon as we realised Ukraine was just around the corner and, on the top of that, the shortest way to reach Bucharest was to cross its southwest, our eyes start immediately shinning with the perspective of adding a new country to our adventure. A faraway rather unknown country for Portuguese standards, to spice things up. So, even though strongly recommended to avoid it as much as we could, even though aware we would have to wait at least 3 hours at the border, even though having many doubts whether we fulfilled all the requirements to be granted clearance, we again didn’t really have a choice. At 4 am, 3 hours after arriving from our farewell party in Slovakia, there we were again on the road and still heading east.

It took us a little more then half an hour to arrive to the border. As for quick achievements, we were done for the day. The queue was not too big, but neither was the efficiency of the Ukrainian customs personal. It took us over 3 hours to finally reach the customs, with our problems far from being over. Despite the HUGE success Le Deuch made among the Ukranian customs personal (there were about 6 of them around it, asking me all king of questions, checking the whole car, everything, but…the things I was bringing along with me), we weren’t in the end granted permission to get in, as we were missing a proxy from my father, the registered car owner. But Le Deuch success was impressive: 3 customs officers actually recommended us to go back in Slovakia, find a notary, forge a proxy and then they themselves would let us pass. Hilarious, hum?


Slovakia and Hungary
Ukraine NIET!!! So, back on EU soil, but not before Le Deuch be granted again the possibility to “show off” a little more: back in the Slovakian border, even if in reality we never left the country, we again had 5 customs officials inspecting the car from top down, asking me permission (?!) to open every door, seat inside, open the capot and as well the trunk, but simply to see how big it was. Those were 5 smiling people!

At 8.30 am we were again rolling through the Slovakian countryside, heading to Hungary, where we would finally cross to Romanian (between the Hungarian city of Debrecen and the Romanian Oradea). As always, driving through the Slovakian and Hungarian countryside was amazing. I’m indeed running out of adjectives to qualify it. Astonishing views at any corner. In Slovakia, we have nature on its pure status, with hardly any sign of “human touch”. In other hand, at the more urban Hungary there is a constant concern with the preservation of its many idyllic natural treasurers, always making them easily accessible and providing all the needed facilities to make them much more then a simple amusement to your sight.

Romania
One wouldn’t need to get indication to realise the border between Hungary and Romania was crossed, as the differences from one side of the border and the other are notorious. As soon as you are in, you can immediately understand you are in a very special country, for the good and for the worse.

The whole picture changes. Grey dominates the landscape, the peoples faces become a harder and sadder, as a perfect metaphor of their past and still as well present hard life conditions, but still displaying a proud pair of eyes. But the look on the people is just one of the many scars from the communist Era still to be found in any corner. It’s, to say the least, impressive the quantity of old, massive, partially or completely destroyed building you come across. Factories, Chemical Plants, Mines, Dams… the skeletons of the old communist regime are everywhere, as if still preventing all the surrounding nature to grow greener. The quality of the roads as well decreases substantially: no highways to be found (only two very close to Bucharest), old pavements, maintenance works all over, falling bridges and crossing villages and cities centres every 15 minutes, filled with old (mostly) and new Dacias, the Romanian made car. The cities we crossed on the west part of the country (Oradea, Cluj Napoca, Sibiu, to list the main ones) as well didn’t add nothing too different to the picture. We weren’t able to visit the historical centre of any of them, but its global image is very similar: messy organisation, again high all alike residential apartment blocs, all old and colourless. Another impressive thing is the quantity of people walking on the side of the road hitch hiking, this at any hour of the day or night. Any hour really! This together with the fact that you are constantly crossing with horse carriages, even when travelling national roads.

The landscape only changes considerably after passing Sibiu. Some 15 Km ahead you face your first mountain landscape, with a beautiful course of water always welcoming you on the valley. Beautiful mountain road, we were only sorry to cross already with the night falling quickly.

After a long, long, long journey, we were finally in Bucharest around 2.30 am. But our day was not over before another little adventure: I still needed to find Iuli’s house, in this massive metropolis. The plan seemed simple: to get a cab to drive in front of me till the spot. Easy if not for the fact that speaking English to a cab driver in Bucharest makes his eyes turn into €. Not being up to be ripped off right at my arrival, we simply took it “our way”: asked around, till a man offered to hop in the car and takes to Iuli’s apartment. In exchange of a bottle of Bagaço, our problems were solved by 3:45 am!

As sum up of our first journey through Romania, and looking back from the days we have now spent here, one thing stands out: coming in from the west, one would hardly believe the treasurers this country has to offer. But we will get back to that the next time we will be again granted internet access.

Love,
TMA