Romania is a land of a thousand faces.
The crossing point between the Occident and the Orient.
And a melting pot of different cultures.
And is also a country unlike any other in Europe.
With over half of the Carpathian mountain range weaving through it,
Romania is the custodian of Europe's greatest surviving mixed forest
and two-thirds of its apex predators.
As well as native Romanians, it is home to Hungarian,
Saxon,
Roma,
Serbian,
Greek and many more divers peoples
united by the borders of a nation
that stretches to the mouth of the Danube.
However, Romania's natural and built heritage
is under threat from reckless development
and a race to modernize which often destroys
the very things that could ensure prosperity for generations to come.
Welcome back to our ongoing odyssey
around Romania's nine great historic regions.
In this our third episode, we'll be exploring Dobrogea
which includes the Black Sea Coast
and the Danube Delta, Europe's largest wetland.
This vast network of lakes, reed beds and channels
fans out across rich alluvial planes,
providing a nesting ground for almost 300 species of migratory bird
and containing within its borders a priceless UNESCO biosphere reserve.
To immerse ourselves fully in this magical water world
we're leaving the bygone dry land
and embarking on a three-day cruise
through the Delta's labyrinths and channels
aboard friend and ornithologist Dan Petrescu's luxury floating hotel.
This is arguably the most comprehensive way to see the Delta.
With 12 comfortable air condition cabins powered by solar panels,
a spacious dining room
and plenty of deck space from which to admire your surroundings.
Our place of departure is a small marina in the city of Tulcea
self-styled gateway to the Delta
and a casting off point for many of the ferries and boat tours
that navigate this 3.000 square kilometre wilderness.
- Danny! - Hey, Charlie!
- Hello! - Hello! Ciao!
- How are you? - Very well.
- Welcome to Tulcea!
We were three-and-a-half days on the boat to see it.
Yes, three-and-a-half days of wilderness and birds.
Danny's the Doctor Doolittle of birds, I hasten to say.
I don't know anyone who knows not only the Latin name for every single bird
that frequents the Delta, but also what they sound like.
Let me just ask you, for example,
what about...
what noise does a kingfisher make?
- What about... - That's a kingfisher coming to the nest.
What about a coot?
Well, that's a little bit more complicated because it's doing a scream, it's...
- Okay. - It's very sharp.
And the Latin name?
- The Latin name it's Fulica Atra. - I told you I was not joking.
- This is gonna be fun. - Yeah.
Well, it's the easiest bird in the world.
Yeah, I thought I'd start you off with something simple.
Ibis Tours! Thank you very much.
- Next one over, right? - Yeah.
Leaving Tulcea behind,
you feel the weight of the world shrug itself from your shoulders
replaced by a deep sense of calm,
enhanced by the sight of the treeline shore
scrolling gently past on either side.
The Delta spreads outward like the branches of an enormous tree
from the three main channels or trunks named after its principal towns.
For our first section of the journey
we're heading down the southernmost arm
towards Sfântu Gheorghe on the Black Sea Coast.
Sadly, too many people come to the Delta for day trips
and burn around in speed boats,
creating waves,
polluting the water,
eroding the river banks
and generally seeing very little.
On the other hand, lounging on the deck
watching the landscapes slip majestically past
as you sip a cold beer
gives you ample time to take in the scenery
and marvel at what is one of the world's most fragile
and irreplaceable ecosystems.
Meanwhile, things were happening down in the galley.
I risked a brief intrusion to discover what was on the menu for later.
- What are we preparing here? - Stuffed pike.
So this is the tenderising process for the pike
'cause I'm presuming she's gonna debone it
and take out the meat, and then do something interesting with it.
And then being stuffed it's gonna go back in.
You have to know what you're doing 'cause pike is quite a bony fish as well.
It's just like peeling off your socks.
You could add lots of things to this as well
and do a kind of fusion cuisine twist.
Today, we're doing it the traditional way.
But I like the fact we're using the meat mincer for everything.
This fantastic aroma comes out of the other end.
I can't help thinking
just a tiny squeeze of lemon might also be quite nice.
But hey, this is tried and tested for generations.
Pepper. Black pepper, lots of it.
So it's garlic with sour cream. May I?
It's very nice actually just having it like this.
Like a Danube Delta sushi.
That's such an inventive way to stuff a fish!
And then you just put the head back on, and nobody knows.
You don't have to be a taxidermist to do this recipe,
but it probably helps.
By tea time, we'd found a mooring just upstream of Sfântu Gheorghe.
And the opportunity presented itself to disembark for a ramble
along the beach at dusk.
It's an arresting thought,
that while the sun casts its final rays over the mouth of the Danube,
the other end of this mighty river is being cloaked in darkness
for well over an hour.
There are few beaches in Romania that are as unspoiled and empty as this one.
Thankfully, it's a protected area,
so hopefully, it won't be desecrated by high-rise hotels
in another 20 years.
However, there are a couple of temporary wooden pop-up bars
that operate during the summer months
and offer refreshments to the thirsty traveler.
As the light was fading, it was back to our buoyant base camp
for dinner and a fitting end to our first day in the Delta.
The best moment to catch wildlife is just after dawn.
But it's also chilly, even in the summer months,
so warm clothing is a must.
We're up early for a pre-breakfast safari
to nearby Melia lagoon,
marooned from the sea by the fast-growing Sacalin Peninsula
formed from alluvial silt deposited by the river
and swept south from the estuary mouth by prevailing currents.
This protected stretch of shallow water
provides a secluded breeding and feeding ground
for many Delta bird species
and the great vantage point from which to do a spot of twitching.
However, the main attraction,
the one species we were counting on to see,
was conspicuous by its absence.
Where are the pelicans, man?
They are in the opposite direction from where we are.
- Yeah. - We came a bit too late probably.
Yeah?
'Cause they start to feed very early in the morning when it's a hot day.
There's a greenshank.
- Is that what they sound like? - Yes. Just took off.
And when they take off they whistle.
What's greenshank in Latin?
Greenshank in Latin it's Tringa Nebularia.
What's that? Below on the reeds.
The purple heron. Another purple heron.
And the cormorants are coming in.
- Cormorants are very efficient in... - Diving.
...diving in deep water.
- But they're efficient in any situation. - That's why there are so many of them.
And that's why they are so hated by fishermen all over the world.
They get a bit of a tough deal, doesn't it?
- Yeah. Being smart is never... - How would you know?
Well, ask me how I know.
For this second stretch of our journey
I decided to leave home comforts behind
and rely on more manual forms of transport.
There are lots of ways to get to Sfântu Gheorghe
at the mouth of the Danube Delta.
You can go by boat.
You can go by helicopter.
Or you can go by motorized canoe.
Alternatively...
See you on the other side.
Little choppy.
What a beautiful day!
For a swim.
It's amazing to think this river flows right across Europe
divides countries, borders
and provides a living for a huge number of people in the Delta.
Well, I'm not cheating.
Luckily, as you can probably tell, we have a support boat
which is quite important when you're swimming
in one of the largest riparian motorways in Europe.
Stick to the middle now
'cause there's a rubbish boat coming in from Tulcea.
That would be a glorious way to go, wouldn't it?
Mowed down by a rubbish boat.
It's good to see that people are actually collecting rubbish
from the Danube Delta.
- Doesn't always happen, does it? - Well, not in these remote places.
Since plastic was born
not much was collected for many years, and it ended up in the Black Sea.
Yeah.
Do you wanna be fished with a boat or just walk on the shore?
I walk on the shore for a little bit.
- It's sharp there. - Yeah, I can see.
You might get some...
- You mean I might graze my little toes? - Yes, you might.
- Thank you for watching out for me, Dan. - Your pinkie is in danger.
You're such a fairy godmother. You really are.
I am.
We made it, Charlie.
We most certainly did.
Thank you, Dan.
It's a bit of a special treat for me to do this.
But it just shows that Danube Delta is a playground of activities, isn't it?
So, onwards.
Welcome to Sfântu Gheorghe, a historic fishing village
with sandy streets and classic wattle and daub houses.
They're brightly painted adobe walls capped with weed-thatched roofs
set back from the road by carved wooden fences
and colourful gardens, teeming with flowers and organic veg.
And then there's this.
Sadly, the most prominent feature in town
is a communist-era block of flats
that towers like a giant carbuncle over the landscape
and screams poverty and neglect.
Unfortunately, it's also the first thing tourists see
when they disembark from their boats and cruise ships
and does nothing to enhance Romania's reputation
as an emerging country.
I've come here to visit one of my favourite places to eat in Dobrogea
an unassuming local bar and restaurant called La Sfătoi
which serves traditional fare
including a delicious recipe for sea snails.
- Rapane. - Superb.
- Thank you so much. - My pleasure. Enjoy!
Cheers!
That's really good.
Lots of garlic. Lots of chilli.
It wakes you up after a long swim.
Rapane is not actually an indigenous species to the Black Sea.
They got brought over on a Japanese boat allegedly
and populated these areas,
and being an invasive species,
from the conservationists' point of view,
they are not really the kind of thing you want in your ecosystem,
so I'm doing my little bit to reduce their number.
Gentlemen.
After lunch, I was due to meet Bebe and Florin.
They run cycling tours across the Delta,
and they brought a spare bike for me
in order to complete the next stretch over land
alongside a man-made canal that links Sfântu Gheorghe to Sulina.
This is actually a very nice spot here.
We got a sort of salt flat with all sorts of waders, birds...
Not a lot of water at this time of year.
Well, it's a bit dry all around Europe right now.
Where the reddish area usually is a bit more salt
and you can see all the ships queuing up.
I know. If you want evidence of the long far-reaching ramifications of a war,
you only have to look at those boats, don't you?
Yeah, exactly. They're queuing up, they can't go up the Danube too long.
There's only six boats that are going up and down.
You guys take trips all over the Delta, don't you, not just this route.
Well, most of the people we have are cycling or nature enthusiasts
that usually bike along the Danube and once they get to Tulcea,
there's no real way of seeing the Kilometre Zero point,
and, you know, when you have a destination in your mind,
and you can't see the final point, it's a bit frustrating.
And Florin had a brilliant idea and has a cooperation
that ensures that we get to actually both points of the Kilometre Zero
- down in Sfântu Gheorghe and Sulina. - So you get double whammy.
Yeah, but basically is the satisfaction of reaching the end point
knowing where it all ends, and this is a fantastic place to end up.
It is, but it's not really Zero Point anymore, is it,
'cause the Delta is moving out into the sea
something like, I don't know, three meters a year.
More or less, yes.
That's the general amount as the Danube silts up into the sea
and grows along,
the dry land slowly moves toward the Delta
and the Delta spreads into the sea
as the sediments start building up more and more, and more.
The sun was well past the yardarm
as we reached the historic port of Sulina.
Once, among the richest towns in Romania,
and since bombed, usurped, neglected and still partly unrestituted,
its once regal buildings
crumbling beneath the weight of time and legal contestations
that unfold as lazily as the vast bodies of grey waters
that drift past its concrete quays.
There're small signs of a revival in its fortunes
due mostly to cultural tourism
and exemplified by the new wave of hotels and restaurants
that welcome visitors during the summer months.
But for us, the finish line was a few clicks the other side of town.
Past the historic cemetery,
where sailors, pirates and princes were laid to rest
and down to the shores of the Black Sea.
It's a bit tough on sand, isn't it?
- Yeah, but we've done it! - We made it!
- To the beach!
I'm looking forward to a swim. Or maybe...
- Should we have a cold beer first? - Yeah. It's hot.
- We've earned it. - I think we have.
Let's park them.
Pirate's Fishery.
There's a lot of pirate paraphernalia around here, isn't it?
- Yeah... - It's very...
It's a piratical town, if you believe the legends.
The legends from the Golden Ages of Sulina, you know?
Yeah, the Golden Ages, when people were robbed and murdered,
and their boats looted.
Everything started here in the middle of 19th century
together with the Danube Commission.
It was a new way opening up toward Central Europe.
- So it's a man-made channel? - Yeah. It's a man-made channel.
I read it was built by an Englishman. Is that right?
Yeah. The one engineer which was working actually on the Suez Channel,
Sir Charles Hartley, was brought here as a chief engineer for the Channel.
But it was on the sea itself, wasn't it?
The proof of that is the light tower in the centre of Sulina.
This is the ending point of the Danube Delta,
but it's called Kilometre Zero because of the Danube Commission.
This river starts here, not at the springs.
It's vice versa.
So many bike people they go along the Danube.
It's very fine to combine the boat and the cycling.
It's very pleasant to go down the river with the bike.
The people cycle the whole way down the Danube.
Yeah. Not at once, but frame by frame.
They all want to reach Kilometre Zero. It's something like...
- And it's a nice feeling. - Of course.
And you can jump in the sea afterwards, which is always good.
What I like about this beach is that it's not overdeveloped.
- It's reasonably pristine, isn't it? - Yeah.
It's got a nice bohemian vibe. I just hope it stays this way.
But this is always a double-edged sword.
The more it gets known, the more people come.
- It's a fine balance here. - Yeah, I know.
Do you just want me to feel really guilty?
Turn off your television immediately. You haven't seen this.
Don't tell your friends.
This place doesn't exist.
We just made it up.
We have here in Romania 240 km of coast,
of which 120, the southern part, is well developed.
The other part, the northern part, should be like this. Wild.
Later that evening, I'm reunited with the boat,
now moored in a small channel northeast of Crișana.
One of the nicest things about mooring up for the evening
are the peace and quiet you experience after the day's traffic is subsided.
With no need for a generator,
thanks to Dan's small forest of solar panels
you can sit on the deck with a sundowner
and soke up the natural sounds of the Delta
provided you remember to put on the mosquito repellent.
Before sunrise, the next day, we ventured out again
in the hope of a more substantial pelican encounter.
This time, however, luck was on our side.
Why do they cluster like that in such a tight group?
Well, you see how they splash the water.
A very spectacular moment now when they come together
because they herd the fish with the cormorants together
and they take advantage of the panic and they catch the fish much easier.
The pelicans from the back are flying to the front all the time,
so it's like an exchange, everybody has to get some,
so they are taking advantage of... flap the wings,
make the fish go further and they advance...
It's quite a complex social group, isn't it, really, the pelicans?
Yes, they are gregarious birds and they stay together
and it's safety in numbers, but also success in numbers.
How long would they stay here before they migrate south again?
The pelicans arrive early in spring.
They are leaving this area
because they travel quite a long time towards Africa in October.
Even in November you can find some pelicans left behind.
The chicks are flying away from the colony in late August,
beginning of September...
So these birds right now have their nests
and they're gonna be taking the fish back to feed their young.
Yes. Now we are in the vicinity
of the greatest colony of pelicans in Europe.
It's right behind us, about 15 km.
And there are over 20,000 breeding pelicans there.
White pelicans, because we have two species.
- Dalmatian pelicans. - And white pelicans.
- Which are solitary, which I know. - Yes, very good.
And they don't have spots.
They don't have spots, they're just called Dalmatian.
Is the population relatively stable year to year?
Yes. Actually, in the last few years,
we discovered that the population it's much bigger than anticipated.
The statistics were saying that the pelicans in the Delta
are within 12 to 15,000,
but after a proper count, scientific count,
we discovered that there are actually 32,000.
The fishermen must've been thrilled to know that.
Yes. There was a big buzz at the time
that that's why there's no fish in the Danube Delta
because the pelicans are too many,
but I think this population exists since a very long time.
And there are probably more tangible reasons
why the fish numbers are going down.
Yes. It's a cumulative effect.
Silting...
Silting, disturbance, overfishing from people,
the disappearing of land, transformed into agricultural land.
And also the nitrates the people are using on agricultural land
get into the water and that causes deoxygenation, doesn't it?
Yeah, the whole Europe is spraying with fertilizers
and of course, it's ending up in the Danube Delta
and you have, sometimes, this explosion of vegetation
which consume the oxygen and then you have a problem.
Low oxygen environment, they can't breathe.
- Exactly. - Yeah.
Another must see in this part of the Delta
is the ancient Letea Forest, part of the UNESCO biosphere reserve
and the northernmost subtropical forest in Europe.
On the way, I'm making a quick pit stop on the banks of the Madgearu Channel
to meet eccentric local beekeeper Dudu Constantin,
who has hand-built his very own tractor.
It's never gonna win Car of the Year on Top Gear.
Nor is it likely to make it on a grand tour of Transfăgărășan,
but I'm interested to see how it runs
and to check out the efficacy of a vehicle
cobbled together from spare parts.
How often do you move the hives?
I go with the beehives to the harvest area.
- By car? - By car and with the trailer.
How many times do you harvest the honey in a year?
Depending on the harvest I have.
For example, the first one in this area is for acacia.
Now I came for the sunflower.
- After that I go for the wild mint. - Mint?
Mint honey, that sounds delicious.
Probably quite good in the mojito.
So at the moment he's checking off
how much honey he produced with which hive.
To put a new frame in,
I need to take one off and put it in another hive with less frames.
On this foil they build their own cells
for honey and bee larvae.
- On this frame, there are young bees. - OK.
Now I have put this frame between one frame with young bees
and the new frame, so that they can fill it quickly.
If this frame isn't filled in four days,
it means there's a problem with the hive.
Either there's no queen, or she became lazy,
so there's something wrong with the hive and I must intervene.
Do you get stung a lot?
Each time I work with the hives,
five or six bees may sting me or absolutely none.
It depends on the weather.
Meaning, if it's cloudy, they are meaner.
If the weather is like this and the bees are busy harvesting,
they ignore me.
Bee keeping is an integral part of life in the countryside, here in Dobrogea.
And wherever you go,
especially on the sides of the roads where you see fields of flowers,
they park their trucks and they harvest the pollen
that is produced by the growing of sunflowers
and oil seed rape or anything else that's been planted,
but here in the Delta,
because of the abundance of the wild flowers as well
you get so many interesting varieties of honey
and particularly I'm keen to try the mint.
Anyway, onwards and outwards, we now off to Letea Forest,
as soon as I can get out of this.
Hopefully, there's a horse and cart waiting
and it's gonna take us
deep into the biosphere reserve.
The only way to get here is by boat
disembarking at the adjacent Letea village
where an entourage of safari trucks and horses and carts
sit waiting to scoop you up
and transport you the remaining few miles.
This influx of tourists
has improved the quality of life for many of Letea's inhabitants
and lead to a spate of new pensions and restaurants
offering hot meals and overnight accommodation.
Ciao!
A good time to come to Letea is tea time
onwards, in the summer,
because most of the tourists have left to go back to Tulcea
and you feel like you've got the place to yourself.
Plus, it's not quite as hot.
In the baking heat of the day, on the dusty tracks,
this can be quite grueling, especially for the horses.
I see. I sit up here.
Let's go!
- Shall we? - Yes.
Having found a suitable carriage, we clattered down soporific streets
and out into the countryside following a rickety dirt track
toward the tree-lined horizon.
Letea Forest sits on a thin layer of fertile soil...
cloaking the dense network of sand dunes
that were once a part of the seabed.
As you pass beneath a canopy of ancient oak trees, white poplar,
ash and silver lime, you enter a different world.
Home to 500 species of plant and 1.600 species of insect
this is a treasure trove of biodiversity.
Hanging creepers like the silkvine, liana, common hop and ivy
imbue the forest with an ethereal quality...
as due the open fields of dunes
where the thinner topsoil can only sustain scrub and coarse grass,
and the equine population that feeds on it.
The wild horses of Letea
are actually feral horses because they were released
at the end of the communist regime
they got loose and they bred,
and they filled this area.
In fact, they've now put a fence around Letea Forest
because they were doing huge amount of damage
to Romania's oldest nature reserve established in 1938.
They were stripping the bark off the trees.
There're still horses here, not so many, but...
what a beautiful place.
Really. And peaceful.
It has a mystical quality to it.
Back at the floating hotel,
now anchored at the edge of Roșu Lake,
it was the final night of the tour.
And our resident musician was preparing to serenade the setting sun.
Traveling on a cruise in the Delta
is all about spending time with your friends.
And we have this rare opportunity to see Mihai Toma,
who composed the soundtrack for Flavours of Romania, season one.
Of course.
You're gonna be writing some new material here being inspired.
Yes, some new songs being inspired by this amazing landscape.
Right now, I wrote some pieces of music, some lecturing music,
a fusion with flutes and ideas that came out of this...
From looking out at this.
Of these mermaids. You see those mermaids?
- Yeah, in my mind's eye. - Exactly.
It is a landscape to be inspired by, isn't it?
I mean, this is for artists, for creative people,
this is a place to come to feel uplifted...
I've never imagined that the space that you are writing in
matters so much.
So instead of living in a box
and playing there with the keyboard, and seeing walls and everything,
now the ceiling is the infinite sky.
And the infinite horizon gives you infinite possibilities in a way.
- It does. - Exactly.
So, Mihai, I wanna hear what you've come up with so far.
Yes, I'm glad to show you.
Because we might be using this in the show.
Of course, you can use it.
Your first impressions of being here on the Delta.
The following morning,
it was time to say goodbye to Dan and the gang
and head back to Tulcea,
via a quick visit to one of the Delta's most picturesque communities.
Situated on a small island
besides a remote waterway of the Sulina Channel
Mila 23 has so far avoided a concrete makeover
leaving it one of the more unspoiled fishing villages in the Delta.
For the growth of tourism in the Danube Delta
communities such as Mila 23
now have an alternative source of income to fishing.
So we see new hotels, new bars, excursions, floating pontoons.
We can sit out, have a beer
and watch the boats and the pelicans drift past.
Away from the waterfront, Mila 23 is a network of narrow streets,
floral alleyways and backyards, and sheltered enclaves.
While some measures of privacy seems paramount
in such a tight-knit community, outsiders are welcomed with open arms
as I found out on many previous occasions.
A short ferry ride across the Sfântu Gheorghe Channel from Tulcea
was a dirt and gravel road
which runs parallel to the northernmost branch of the Danube
and serves as a natural border between Romania and the Ukraine.
At the far end is the town of Chilia Veche
from which the Channel takes its name.
I've exchanged the bike for the crew car
to see what steps are being made to attract tourists
to this the third and arguably the most isolated town in the Delta.
A good place to stay is the Limanul ecolodge
with its reed-thatched roof
and traditional wooden design
stamped with the signature blues and whites of the region.
My arrival heralded an impromptu barbeque
and the chance to taste another seasonal delicacy.
Sensational!
Mackerel cooked on open fire,
one of the signature Danube Delta dishes.
Chilia Veche affords access
to some of the least travelled parts of this gigantic wetland.
Mister mayor.
I'm meeting its mayor, the youngest in Romania,
for a guided tour of nearby lakes and channels...
Bon voyage!
...to find out how he plans to promote this undervalued part of the Delta.
I speak French.
I speak English and a little bit of Romanian.
Hi! Charlie. Nice to meet you.
My pleasure, sir!
Excellent! You do speak a little bit of English.
- So and so, yes? - Yes, yes.
- So they live here? - Yeah.
All summer?
Yes, and during spring and autumn they fish. They live here.
You do realize they earn their living here.
I want to get them together in an association
and allow them to grow.
And how can they do that? By accessing European funds.
OK. What am I interested in doing on this platform?
We register it in the Land Registry, we give it to the fishermen,
and then they can access projects for the fishing nets, boats,
and put on the map the local gastronomic places.
Then, every tourist, every people, may come and eat, do some fishing
and come here in the middle of nature.
I think it's a great idea to bring tourist somewhere like this
where they can have ciorbă de pește...
A fresh one.
...they can see the life.
It's such an insight into the Danube Delta life, you know?
Exactly.
Especially here, where the accommodation is almost like one's home.
There's electricity, a bathroom, a shower.
- The accommodation is normal. - Palinka?
In terms of Chilia, there seems to be a beautiful place to stay,
there are tourists coming,
but it doesn't seem to be an awful lot for people to do in Chilia.
I hope that in the near future
we will be able to offer kayak tours in the Delta.
I'm 90% convinced that we'll be able to do tours on horseback.
Horse riding. We visit the Delta on horseback.
It's something different.
And my close to heart project and the most important one
is to put in place the traffic between Romania and Ukraine,
Chilia Nouă and Chilia Veche.
Chilia Veche here and Chilia Nouă in Ukraine.
If it wasn't for this war, today we could go to Ukraine.
Discussions with the mayor of Chilia Nouă are well advanced,
with their Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and they all agreed,
but the war has begun, so we're on hold.
Until Romania entered the EU, it was possible to go back and forth.
As far as I know, there are many people in Chilia Veche
with relatives in Chilia Nouă: Cousins, sisters, sisters-in-law.
Since we entered the EU, a border has been set.
The closest crossing point in Ukraine is at Isaccea-Orlovca.
Instead of walking 370 meters, we have to make a 117 km detour.
My friend, English friend.
Come here.
I want your palinka, plum brandy. It's OK, it's for personal consumption.
Thank you very much.
- Just a moment. Let me take a glass. - Yeah.
- Good health! - Good health!
Yes.
It's an amazing life being here. I know it's tough,
but you're out here in the nature, the tranquility, you know?
- It's beautiful, right? - Yeah.
Are you happier here?
- Yeah. - Yeah?
It's my country.
I think there's a message.
Romania is fabulous,
and for all of you Romanians living abroad,
come home!
We're gonna go and get the nets.
Now Paulică is gonna fish the nets out.
Wait a second to take my utensil and we're going... to show you.
The utensil for tools adjustment.
If the angle is not right, the fish won't go in.
- Fish won't go in. - No.
Let's see if we can find anything alive.
Now we shake this funnel-shaped basket to see what's inside.
Let's see.
- One fish. - One fish?
One fish.
- A common rudd. - A common rudd.
- Common rudd. - It's not big.
Two, three.
Look.
Full!
- We're harvesting, right? - Yeah, it's good.
- Good? - Good. Alive.
- Delicious? - Delicious.
- Tench. - Tench.
That's about 50 bani.
- Fifty bani. - Fifty bani.
- Not 50, ten bani. - Ten bani.
We have found a fortune in fish!
Eureka!
Let's go open the champagne!
- Oh, my God! - Champagne.
It's tough.
We can't even buy the label from the bottle.
We cannot buy a quarter of the label.
- Shall we go? - We're going. Ready.
- Ready? - Thanks!
It's not easy, you know?
It's not an easy life...
to catch, you know, 20 bani in your net.
Before we resume our journey south along the Black Sea Coast,
I wanted to stop for the night at an aspirational ecolodge
a 20-minute ride from Tulcea.
This is Casa Varvara, brainchild of two families
who moved to Romania from Italy and the UK
to create their own little Eden on the hills overlooking the Delta.
The original building dates from 1904
and takes its name from its previous owner Varvara,
who was a village midwife.
There are now six houses available to rent
combining an elegant fusion of Italian, English, and Dobrogean design
and affording stunning views across the lakes and channels.
I caught up with co-owners Cristina and her husband Cătălin
to find out why they decided, after many years living in the UK,
to relocate to their homeland.
Cătălin, it's been quite a journey, hasn't it,
to get here from your life in the UK?
- It has been, yeah. - Tell me about that.
Well, like many other Romanians,
we ventured abroad when we were younger
looking for a better life
and we had a good life for quite a few years.
And then we had kids
and we were quite happy,
but there's an old English saying that says,
"Home is where your heart is."
We're not from this area originally.
We were born in other parts of Romania.
And we became locals.
- Dobrogeni. - Dobrogeni.
We discover every year new things about Dobrogea.
We think it's a fantastic place
and you can never get tired of it.
I think it's a wonderful gift to give your kids, isn't it,
the benefit of a multicultural upbringing?
When we first moved here, actually my oldest son said,
"You know, mom, I feel free here, freedom",
so it's like, he was so happy.
Yeah. It wasn't an easy decision for us to come back to Romania,
to move back to Romania, but we also feel free here.
And far more relaxing, I imagine, than in England.
And, for us, it was a good decision.
Would you recommend other Romanians to do the same?
Definitely. I think Romania's got huge potential,
it's growing faster than many European countries at the moment
and the quality of life in Romania is going up a lot.
There are more opportunities in Romania.
Especially if we get more people coming from abroad with their ideas
and applied those ideas into different businesses here,
I'm sure Romania's got a bright future.
At the foot of the cliffs is Lake Samova
named after the historic capture of a giant catfish or somn
derived from the Latin word for sleep.
The hotel has kayaks available for those wishing to spend a few hours
paddling its weed-fringed waterways.
While the lake is slowly drying out,
it's still host to numerous bird colonies,
and without the accompanying hum of an engine
it's possible to get even closer to the wildlife.
As I was returning to shore, I met the local fishing boats
heading in from another working day on the water,
and one that it yielded an impressive haul.
For me?
Thanks!
He's looking at you, kid.
I feel a bit guilty.
It's definitely giving me a hard stare, this carp.
That is one hell of a crap, as we call them in Romanian.
Thank you, guys!
Have a good evening!
I'm afraid you're coming with me, my little friend.
Not so little friend actually.
Quite a big friend.
For a borsch, we're giving you another one.
Yeah, fish borsch.
Riding south, we travel parallel to Lake Razim,
once part of the sea.
Today, annexed by a narrow peninsula overlooked by low-lying hills,
dotted with the ruins of medieval castles
and ancient cities that pay testament to lost civilizations
and forgotten chapters in this country's checkered past.
However, some vestiges still remain.
For example, the town of Babadag,
once conquered by the Ottomans
is still a bastion of Turkish culture to this day
with a large Muslim population
and home to the oldest mosque in Romania.
One of the most recent visitors to the Black Sea Coast
is the greater flamingo
which is been gathering here in growing numbers
possibly as a result of global warming.
Colonies of up to three of four hundred birds
have been spotted on the shallow lakes north of Constanța.
But being strictly protected
their locations are a closely guarded secret,
and it's still unknown whether they come to nest
or simply trawl the shallow waters for crustaceans.
We went in search of this elusive species
with the help of naturalist and photographer Cornel Cotorogea
who's been following them since they first starting arriving here.
How long have you been following the flamingos?
Flamingos... let's say four-five years,
when they started to come to Romania.
I think the biggest number was seven some years ago until last year.
Last year, something happened
because there is a huge number of flamingos coming in two locations.
Why do you think their behaviour has changed so dramatically?
Why do you think they're choosing to come here now?
Global warming?
That can be an explanation,
but another explanation can be the expansion of the territory.
They come to find more territories for feeding
because this is what's driving them: The availability of food.
Their numbers are growing, they're not a species in decline.
From what I heard, it's clearly a trend of increasing the population.
There's a lot we don't know about them, isn't it?
Yeah. It's too early.
We have only a few years of observation,
so it's quite difficult to draw conclusions
from only two years,
but maybe after five or ten years we can get more answers to our questions.
More to the right. More...
And there they are.
Absolutely beautiful!
So now if we observe a chick here, it means that they are breeding here.
The chicks are too small now to fly long distances.
- My opinion, they will breed here. - Yeah.
If they find a good place for building the nests...
They have food because one year ago,
they stayed some months here on the lakes and they had food.
Cornel, it's been great meeting you. Thank you so much.
You're welcome.
The capital of the Dobrogea region is Constanța,
one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in Europe
dating back to 600 BC.
Legend has it that Jason and his argonauts landed here
after finding the Golden Fleece.
I've come to the old town waterfront
to visit its most prestigious building
designated a historic monument by the Romanian Ministry of Culture.
Constanța's famous casino has been through many iterations
since the original version was built here in 1880.
Its most recent incarnation opened in 1910
hosted a firmament of famous guests
including the Russian Imperial family.
Sadly, it closed in the 90s and fell into rapid decay.
But funds have now been made available
and restoration work is almost complete.
I met ministry rep. Mihaela Pușnava
for a chance to see behind the veil.
- It's big. - It is.
During the First World War it was a hospital for the Red Cross,
so it was bombed by the Germans.
It was supposed to be a war crime at the time.
It was redone in '36 and finished in '38,
under the plans of the original architect, Daniel Renard.
I think he oversaw the building.
- And then, what happened after that? - Well...
I know it was a thriving casino for a while.
Actually during the 20s and the 30s,
sometimes they got a license, sometimes they didn't
because it was thought to be very immoral,
but it was very hard to upkeep, so it was like,
let's get some money, make it running, okay, now we ban it again...
So it went through a lot of interesting history.
It was done right after the Nation State had been warned
and we had recovered Dobrogea,
Constanța was becoming a huge economic port.
It had only been like a Turkish fishermen village before,
so we only had the peninsula
and everything that thrived was during that era, the Guilded Age.
And I think that they wanted this building...
- To personify that. - Yes.
We want progress, we want prosperity, we want to show that...
- Opulence, basically. - Yes.
Supervising a restoration of this magnitude is a huge undertaking
as we found out from the project manager Gabi Puchiu.
Hi!
- Charlie. Nice to meet you. - Gabi.
Gabi, congratulations!
It's wow!
- A lot of work, isn't it? - A lot.
When I took over this project, two and a half years ago,
it was almost in ruins
due to the fact it was raining, there were no windows,
saline environment,
the building was on the verge of destruction.
What does restoration entail?
The restoration... First of all, the consolidation was done.
For the building to keep on existing,
100 piles were driven six meters deep
and then we started with the concrete.
We're using the best concrete for saline environment.
It is like a laboratory
where the new decorative elements are restored,
reconditioned, recreated.
Some of them deteriorated.
We had to select the old forms and redo them.
On the inside, we work with plaster,
on the outside, we work with micro concrete.
Presumably you're working from old photographs.
Old photographs
and everything from the original 1910 building.
What we are doing nobody else does,
because there are no more specialists.
We are trying to make a new school
for the renovation and restoration of old buildings.
What does it mean for you to be working on this project?
I have been interested in this casino since I was little.
When I was one year old, I came here with my parents,
I disappeared, and they found me under the table.
When I was ten years old,
I took a photo of the casino
and after 50 years I came back to restore this wonderful building.
And that's you there?
So touching! Incredible!
And you'd never have guessed that would be your place of work...
however many years later.
I'll donate this photo to the casino museum,
let the descendants of our descendants see that we passed by here
and accomplished this beauty together with my colleagues.
It's been haunting you all your life this building.
Yes.
It's true.
Below Constanța,
you encounter the bulk of Romania's beachside holiday resorts.
Many of them predate the fall of communism
and possess Greco-Roman names like Neptune, Jupiter or Saturn,
and evoke expectations of classical Hellenic architecture.
Sadly, the truth is rather different.
I have come to Olimp
which has received something of a makeover in recent years.
The President now has a house here.
And smart new clubs attract celebrity clientele
with their lounge vibe, artisan cocktails, DJs, and live music.
For something completely different,
a rutted dirt track through the forest
takes you to a much less crowded stretch of shoreline
that sits in stark contrast to its surroundings.
Welcome to Copahavana Beach,
cut off from the road by a railway line
and thus spared the ravages of over-development.
This is perhaps the only beach in Romania
which you could possibly mistake for the French Riviera,
and long may it remains so!
Restaurants and hotels here are not cheap.
But if you want to get away from madding crowd,
this is the place to stay.
And with most menus offering fresh seafood,
it makes an ideal stopover for lunch.
Tocănița is a classic Romanian stew,
but made with seafood becomes fusion cuisine,
and I love the fact that are more and more restaurants around the country
that are popping up
and offering a modern twist on a traditional recipe.
That is really good.
Is a tomatoey, basily, garlicky sauce.
Tastes a bit like gazpacho
with mussels and prawns,
and octopus.
Really good combo!
To check out a more immersive way to experience the Black Sea,
I've come to a smart new marina in the village of Limanu...
which offers sailing excursions and yachts for hire.
Courtesy of Ovidiu, my skipper for the afternoon.
In Romania, the sailing sport is quite young,
Ten, 12 years of age.
I never thought of Romania was a sailing destination really,
but I guess there's potential here
and you can go to lots of places from this coastline, can't you?
The Black Sea is connected with all the world.
We have sailing trips to Turkey, to Bulgaria,
but also to Greece, to Italy.
Khaleesi. Someone is a fan of Games of Thrones around here.
Actually, when they are racing they put Games of Thrones soundtrack.
Super nerds!
Everybody loves it.
Land ahoy!
But not for long.
I'm noticing a distinct absence of crew members,
so you do know what that means.
We're gonna have to sail the ship alone. I mean, I've sailed myself a few times,
but I wouldn't feel confident taking out this 40 footer...
Solo.
So... fingers crossed.
The Water Taxi has got Captain Jack Sparrow on the back of it.
Everywhere we go I'm pursued by pirates.
So now we are on the Lake of Limanu, the fresh water lake,
but Ceaușescu united it with the sea
just to build the shipping yards.
But the white one is interesting.
It was built especially for Ceaușescu to open the Cernavodă Channel.
Negreta was the sea ship for Ceaușescu, for protocol,
and inside there's silverware,
it's luxury furniture with rosewood, mahogany, and everything.
That should be a museum now.
I think it should, but it's a property of the State,
and they are freezing everything.
- They don't even use it. - Exactly.
I think a lot of people would like to visit and to see the ship,
and to have a better usage of it.
I'd be fascinated to see inside.
Me too. I've never seen it, and I've seen it there for ten years.
I love sailing so much! I've missed this.
Is just you, the sea, and the wind.
There's no petrol, no fuel...
just man versus the elements.
Now we have 4.5 knots.
So the wind's dropping slowly, the heat of the day subsides,
but still quite a choppy sea, isn't it?
Yes, this is the Black Sea, this is what it's renowned for.
It rises very quickly, becomes unfriendly with the choppy waves,
and also it calms down really quickly.
If we sail one hour, it will be flat,
- but until then, it's like this. - It's temperamental.
So can tourists come and charter a boat for a day or two
or take it out for a week?
Yes, we call this a charter business
where we rent boats for a day, two days, a weekend, or even for a week,
and they can enjoy sailing.
I imagine, you know, a trip to Istanbul must be pretty exciting.
A trip to Istanbul
it's one thing I recommend to all sailing enthusiasts to do.
They call the Bosphorus a wonder of nature
because it splits two continents.
And if you want to carry on? You've got the Med.
And after Med? Atlantic.
- And then, the world. - Yeah, the world! Exactly!
Romania's widespread lack of interest in its past
combined with limited resources for archaeology and historic preservation
means that many of its Neolithic and pre-Christian sites
still remain cloaked in speculation.
On the other side of Limanu village, lies one of its most intriguing.
While sadly it isn't yet opened to the public,
we were able to obtain permission to visit,
and with the help of renowned speleologist Cristian Lascu
to make an expedition deep underground
in the hope of separating fact from the fiction that is
the mysterious Limanu Caves.
- That should... Bum! - You all right?
Seen that?
I was lucky to have a helmet.
The galleries are large, wide, and low, sort of.
In Britain, you call that laminars cave.
But when people came down here back in the old days?
That they came first, what we know for sure, in the Neolithic,
a few thousand years ago, five, six thousand years ago.
You see, in order to avoid to get lost
locals, they used different...
- Different systems of navigation. - Yeah, yeah.
- This way? - Yeah. Take care.
- I go ahead. - After you.
It looks almost man-made...
these walls.
I want to point out one aspect.
This cave, Limanu Cave, is unique in Romania
at least for two reasons.
First, because of very particular topography.
It's the most labyrinthic cave in Romania.
The second reason is this morphology of the galleries
because you see perfectly horizontally,
and that is a consistency of geology.
In this area, the limestones are horizontal,
embedded limestone,
and there are some vertical cracks.
- And it's exploited the cracks. - Exactly.
You could get lost down here for a long time.
Very easy.
Everywhere, different galleries in different directions
looking very similar.
Here you might see how they managed a sort of altar, shrine.
Because if here the wall has a natural form,
there is clear that they cut it.
Would have been pagan sacrifices?
They used to organize such sacrifices with animals,
but also later the Gets.
The Gets, according to Ovidius,
he described the Gets,
Dacians living in this area,
Dobrogea and the southern part of Romania, were very cruel and bloody warriors.
- So yes, they probably might of used that. - It is possible, yes.
That looks like a human figure in the wall
because you can see there's a head and shoulders.
- Indeed! The shoulders. - There's another one here.
You've got the shoulders here as well and the face,
so these could have been the guardians of the temple
'cause you have to walk past them to get to the altar, don't you?
- I'd love to know! - Yeah...
It seems there's not a huge amount of information, is there?
Yeah.
Here is a sort of window.
This window is naturally created,
but if you go further a few meters,
you will see clear signs of chisels.
There's a lot a bat guano around here.
Yes, that's bat guano, black.
But, come here, please. Here.
Here is a very spectacular morphology.
These platforms.
Horizontal platforms.
They suppose...
Long time ago, they had here potteries and maybe torches here.
- But this would have been another altar? - Yeah.
Well, I think that it'll be a long time, if ever,
before anyone can have more accurate information about these caves.
- A lot more research. - A lot of research.
Unfortunately, no one has done some intensive research here.
So I guess for the time being,
this remains one of Romania's greatest mysteries.
Thank you so much for taking me down here.
- You're welcome. - Now, are you sure we know the way out?
- Do you remember how to get back out? - Yeah.
- You do? - I hope.
If not, that would be the most dramatic end of your documentary.
Yeah, this becomes found footage instead of a documentary.
Years later maybe.
- After you. - Good.
Follow the man with the head torch.
For the final stretch of my journey across Dobrogea,
we're abandoning the tourist trails
and stepping off the beaten track
to go in search of an ancient and mysterious cave church
located near the village of Dumbrăveni on the Bulgarian border.
To get there, you travel through a stark and unfamiliar landscape
of corrugated downs, crisscrossed by ravines and rocky outcrops
sculpted into weird and wonderful shapes.
The Canaraua Fetii cave church is not easy to find.
There's very little about it online, no signs from the road,
and the Satnav sends you to a field of vegetables on a top of a hill.
By a process of elimination,
I finally find myself on a grassy trail
riding further and further into the unknown,
preoccupied with the thought that if the bike were to break down now,
we would be in serious trouble.
Either I've come around the back way,
and I'm gonna find a car park
and a gift shop on the other side,
or this is one of the least promoted places I visited in Romania.
All I can see is an arrow on the cliff up there,
so I think we're in the right place. Let's go find out!
No way!
These are clearly man-made tunnels.
I've no idea why they're here.
Probably for religious purposes.
But it's extraordinary!
Who cuts a little labyrinth halfway up a cliff?
There's a tunnel down there.
And it just goes off into the darkness.
There's a lot of dust.
And clearly, no one has been down here.
There are no footprints, there are no boot prints.
There's something very spooky about this.
- Can you hear that? - Yeah, I heard it.
There's something...
something down there.
Is going quite deep.
Look at it. It's cut straight down into the rock.
Listen.
- I've heard it. - Yeah, me too.
I think there's something there. You need to be careful.
So that's gonna have to remain yet another mystery.
But who built these?
I don't think anybody really knows.
It may be Nosferatu.
This is how horror movies begin. You realize that, don't you?
It's like one of the lights isn't working properly,
I'm on my hands and knees, there are no footprints,
dusty, lots of flies.
Why are they there?
And a pitch-black tunnel that descends into nothing,
disappears into the void.
Yeah. Let's not do what they do in Scooby-Doo.
Let's go check it out!
These holes here
were coffins, stone burial chambers for monks,
or maybe they're even older.
Maybe repurposed by the Christian faith
because there are a couple of postcards and candle wax in that one.
So this was really a necropolis
which still doesn't explain the tunnel going off into the darkness
at the other end.
Or the growling noise.
Well, that's just about all we've got time for this week.
It's been an epic trip around Dobrogea.
I've ticked off a few things on the bucket list, including seeing flamingos
and narrowly avoiding coming face to face with an unknown animal
in a dark tunnel.
Join us next time when we'll be reaching Muntenia.
We're taking an exclusive tour of Europe's heaviest building.
We'll be visiting the final resting place of Vlad the Impaler.
Or maybe not.
And I'll be off-road again,
to explore a UNESCO geopark reserve,
where the ground is literally on fire.
There'll be more cave churches,
more traditional recipes,
and more glimpses into Romania's checkered past.
Only in Flavours of Romania.