TRAVEL. ROAD TRIP. TRANSYLVANIA.

Hiking With Stray Dogs in Romania

Where dogs guarantee your safety in bear country

The fog was hanging low in the mountains. A pasture opened up in front of us. A small mountain river was flowing across the valley and our two guides happily ran next to us.

This was how I imagined hiking in Romania’s wilderness.

But let me start in the morning of this day. We woke up in our beautiful cottage and admired the colored mountain ranges. Fall was way ahead of the rest of the country but there was still some bright yellow shining through.

Since we had arrived late last night we didn’t get to see the location of our little house in the woods. Only now could we grasp the beauty of this place.

After a night filled with stars and bright moonlight, the fog was rising above the forest and mystical creatures might appear out of the woods.

We hadn’t planned on making breakfast and didn’t know there was no restaurant open within 50 kilometers radius. With some cookies, peanuts, and sparkling water we made our war further up the hill.

We were planning to make it to a cave in these mountains. One we had to hike to. But first, we were driving up a dwindling mountain road.

The turnoff to the cave made us drive on a gravel road. Gravel roads we’re used to from Namibia but over there we usually have a car with higher ground clearance.

However, since we had about 7 kilometers ahead of us and the road appeared to get worse, David and I got out of the car, looked at each other, said “30 seconds” and nodded.

Yes, we blew down the tires. In the meantime, my father was standing next to us telling us we shouldn’t do it and it’s bad and, and, and. We just ignored him and blew all four tires down. For 30 seconds. Surely not a first for us.

But the road eventually got that bad, and David decided to turn around and approach the hiking trail from the main road. We continued a few kilometers further up until we reached just another abandoned holiday village.

We looked for some trail signs and my father spoke to a local man working on one of the houses who told us a time for the destination we would later on triple and still not make it.

However. It’s not about the destination. It’s about the journey. And some people still need to learn that.

Just as we were starting to walk down the gravel road passing old abandoned houses, two dogs came racing around the corner. The smaller one ran ahead of us, the bigger one came tail wagging straight to us.

While we first thought they’d only walk with us until we leave the village, they’d stay much longer.

I said stray dogs because I have no idea where they came from and didn’t see any collars on them but David said they lived with someone in one of those houses.

Those are very smart dogs. I don’t know if they do hike with every traveler coming by but they’ve surely done this trip more than once. The little one waited at every intersection to see which way we’d choose and then run ahead again.

Now and then they disappeared into the forest and we thought they turned around but then all of a sudden they stood ahead of us in the middle of the trail.

Waiting.

Asking what took us so long.

Well, to be honest, I was busy admiring nature. It’s so peaceful and quiet here. You don’t hear any sounds made by humans apart from our breathing.

You cannot just smell and see the beauty of this wilderness but you can hear nature. Birds, rivers, the wind, and all kinds of other sounds are creating one universal sound of the forest.

Lots of mushrooms were growing in the forest.

We walked down a steep part of the trail when the forest all of a sudden opened up in front of us and a mountain pasture stretched for a while in this opening of the woods.

A small mountain river was meandering across the meadow.

While the trail had been well marked up until now, we weren’t sure anymore where exactly we had to continue from now on. There were signboards across the water where my father decided to go. David climbed up the forest on the other side looking for any marked rocks and I found a cave.

It looked a bit scary. The cave. Like a cave, a bear would live in. I stood for a while at the bottom talking to David in the forest. I mean, I was shouting.

Then I decided if a bear was in there he would have come out by now. After all the noise I made. So, I decided to scramble up those few meters to look into the mysterious hole.

There wasn’t much to be seen except for rocks in the forest and what appeared to be the stream bed of water running down after the rain. I turned around and that was when I saw our friends had returned.

I was safe, that was for sure. With the dog sitting down at the bottom I could be sure there was no bear anywhere near. I slowly made my way down the slippery path where my tail wagging friend was waiting patiently.

Then a new challenge arose. David was somewhere in the forest up the mountain out of reach of my voice. I called him numerous times but no echo was coming back. My father was making me a sign from across the river saying we should come to him.

Therefore I decided to climb up the hill, find David and walk down again. When I found him, I also found the markers on the rocks we had been following all day long.

David and I now decided to take this trail further. Therefore I hiked down the hill again, called my father who was now telling me we chose the wrong trail and would go somewhere wrong but still followed me back up the hill.

If you ask my father today about this trip he’ll tell you we didn’t make it to the cave because of this situation where we scrambled up somewhere in the forest and then chose “the wrong trail”.

Remember something I mentioned earlier about the journey and the destination? Yes, I’m trying to teach him something. My father has grown up in these mountains. The Carpathians. Later in life, he hiked the Alps from North to South and East to West. There’s not a corner of those mountains he hasn’t been to.

So yes, he’s a big mountain hiker. But the way he hikes is a way I’ve tried to turn away from in the last few years. And thanks to David, I think I got quite good at it.

When my dad hikes it is all about getting to the peak. Or climbing as many peaks as possible per day. And while doing that of course you have to undercut the written-out time for the trail.

It’s about the destination.

Once he’s reached his destination it’s about getting back down as fast as possible. I don’t know if he’s running from something but this behavior can be very stressful.

We’re trying to slow down now. Him. Our trip. And our excursions.

For us, it’s about the journey.

It’s why we took this trail now. And after another half an hour we reached again a small mountain river we had to cross. David walked further to the right when my father was shouting “the signs show across”.

We did see the signs.

But David wanted to explore the riverbed to the right.

And guess what? There was a hidden cave.

The river was flowing into the cave. We scrambled up first and my father even followed but then soon turned around. He’s a man of staying on the tracks. Following the rules most precisely.

However, he took his phone out now and captured us exploring. We still slid down across the wet rocks onto a lower level and walked into the cave. It was really dark. A deep drop-off was somewhere next to us leading to the water. It’s what we guessed.

We couldn’t see much only with the flashlight could we anticipate a bit more of this space. The ground was getting very slippery and the rocks were round. We decided it was good enough and turned around.

Guess what? Our friends were waiting for us. And my father had said they got pretty nervous when we walked into the cave and climbed up on the hill trying to get to us. Only later they found the entrance and welcomed us on our return.

Such lovely, caring creatures.

To my father’s relief, we could now continue our planned hike. Passing an abandoned house or let’s rather say some ruins of a house.

We got to the mountain cottage from where the cave should only have been 10 minutes away but no signs were to be seen. Looking on Google maps, we followed the gravel road we had found a bit further up, and finally got signboards for the cave.

Another 30 minutes it said. And after walking for 10 minutes, a new signboard appeared and still said 30 minutes while someone had crossed out those numbers and wrote down 45.

Now, I was starting to question our hike. That would be another 1,5 hours just getting there and back. Without the time we’d spent inside the cave. And then we still had another 1,5 hours at least to get from the gravel road back to our parking.

We walked a few more meters when it started to go down the mountain. Very steep. It also had started to drizzle and got dark. It wasn’t late per se but it was late for a hike in November in the woods of the Carpathian Mountains.

We made a group decision and decided to give up on the cave my father wanted to show us and turned around. Looking back at it I obviously can’t tell you how long it would have still taken us but I still think it was the safest decision.

We also still hadn’t eaten anything all day except for peanuts and chocolate bars.

Our two furry friends had been out of sight for almost half an hour by now. I was sure they had given up on us and even if they ran ahead to the cave, we wouldn’t come. How should they know?

And then all of a sudden the dogs were right behind David. We didn’t see or hear them coming. They were just there.

We took the trail back to the pasture my father originally wanted us to take and I found it nice having now a different route to hike on and completing a circle.

It got colder by the minute and the fog was hanging above the ground. A fine drizzle was coming down on us and I would expect a brown bear to turn up behind every corner.

Not that I wanted to see one. But my father was really keen on it. While he surely did see enough of them growing up in this country, he now wants it for me, the passionate photographer.

While I won’t go into a zoo or sanctuary to see a brown bear, I will surely prefer seeing one in the wild. But not while hiking through a thick forest with zero protection. If I spot one across a meadow that’s fine but he shouldn’t cross my path in the woods.

Back to the beginning. We made it to the abandoned village and our car. The dogs disappeared as soon as we reached the first houses. I guess they’ve done their job and are rather hungry now. They surely walked thrice the distance we did.

After another 3 hours on the road, we finally made it to our accommodation. A lovely guesthouse in the outskirts of Turda. Did I mention we hadn’t eaten all day?

The guesthouse had a restaurant and still served us food. I’m sure we would have eaten anything but their meals were delicious!

To be continued…

More about our trip through Transylvania:

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