DAY SIX

Monastery, church, church, church, church, monastery, monastery


But relax, I will restrict myself to one church and two monasteries!

I woke early (as usual) and made my way to the outside seating area of our hotel. I was just in time to catch the sun rising over the Ukrainian hills only 20 km or so away (as the crow flies). To reach the spot on the other side of the border - and river - we would have to drive 40km.

There were some signs of a church through the trees behind the hotel and as soon as the landlady appeared I asked how to get there. What a surprise. An absolutely charming grouping of buildings in a Romanian style which constituted a nunnery, complete with beautiful garden. However, we had stayed in Sapanta overnight so that we could visit "the happy graveyard". An artist had begun to paint lively burial crosses circa 1935 and the tradition has been kept up ever since. In addition the church has been updated to reflect this trend.






The crosses depict - in a very naive, folk art way - the life of the deceased person and, apparently, are quite entertaining. Not as pious and religious as we might expect. Two crosses were for me quite poignant as they seem to have reflected the deaths of children. Painted on both sides the crosses indicated one had died at age 1, and the other might have died in a car accident.




   

We spent all morning and some of the afternoon exploring the country roads (via Breb and Budesti) and stopping at many wooden churches, similar to yesterday. At one, I asked an immediate neighbour about the key and, of course they had it. Rolf was then able to practice his French. The family from Paris were visiting Grandad (custodian of the keys) and came along and explained the history of the church.

Later we stopped at Barsana for my second monastery of the day. This one was very much in the style of the nunnery but much larger, Only begun in 1993 it looked more like a deluxe hotel than a monastery.





What seemed like many hours later, after crossing a good deal of northern Romania. My third monastery of the day. Whereas the religious houses in the west are made of wood, and absolutely amazing fairy-tale structures, those in the east are made of stone and their main feature is usually the paintings on the outside walls which were designed to instruct the illiterate.







Moldavita monastery is within a walled area with a few outbuildings but an amazingly well-kept garden. As you can see, the complete wall on the west side is painted in vivid colours, mainly with the saints etc., but also with other scenes.

However, the big winner of the day was the scenery. Every type of green, wooded or grassy mountain scenery. 







Go to DAY ONE - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY TWO - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY THREE - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY FOUR - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY FIVE - CLICK HERE.

Go to DAY SEVEN - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY EIGHT - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY NINE - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY TEN - CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY ELEVEN- CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY TWELVE- CLICK HERE.
Go to DAY THIRTEEN - CLICK HERE.

For a list of my other (mainly map) blogs - CLICK HERE.

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