Day 21 - Monday 15th June

We managed to get a reasonable night's sleep despite the heat and despite a barking dog. Breakfast was in the gazebo again and consisted of sausages, fried eggs, tomato, fresh bread, jam, honey and coffee but no fruit.

When I mentioned to Alex that I was still trying to catch up on my blog, he suggested that we set out today at 9:30 instead of 9am. As we left the driveway, Alex reminded us of another local custom - namely to put pots on a leafless tree near the front of the house. If there is an eligible young female in the family, then they put a red pot at the top of the tree.

The first stop was the market at a nearby town called Bogdan Voda.The roads along the way were pretty rough but probably not a great deal worse than you see at times in country areas in Australia. Along the way we saw local people walking down the road - usually carrying farming implements.

In particular we were interested in the horses and carts. Many of the carts were piled high with hay - sometimes with somebody perched on top of the hay. Other carts were just carrying people - sometimes with farming implements - and sometimes with the whole family on board.

I was busy taking photos from the car and occasionally we asked Alex to stop so we could get better photos. Suzy decided to use her iPhone to take these photos so that she could easily upload them to Facebook.

The markets were very busy and fascinating. They were clearly aimed at local residents - we were probably the only outsiders there. They were selling a wide range of goods including live poultry, clothes, shoes, produce, jewelry, tools and farming implements.

At the end of the stalls, there were dozens of horses next to the river and a bridge - usually a horse and cart combination. We were not sure if they were for sale but Suzy suspected that this was just the equivalent of their parking lot.

Outside the market area was the statue of Bogdon Voda who was the founder of Moldavia and after whom this town is named.

Alex took us into the grounds of the church across the road from the markets. Unfortunately the church was closed and so we just looked at it from the outside.

Next we went to visit the church at Ieud which is claimed to be the oldest wooden church in Romania. When we arrived, the church was locked up and so Alex made a phone call and ten minutes later a man arrived to open the door for us. He wasn't dressed in religious clothes - in fact, he was wearing a Hard Rock Cafe T-shirt.

As with other churches, it had a dominant position on the hill and was surrounded by graves. While we were waiting, I took the opportunity to take photographs of the surrounding countryside, the people working in the fields with primitive hand-held implements and the horses and carts that were passing by.

The front door of the church had an intriguing lock mechanism consisting of a rod through a whole in the door that connected with a grooved piece of timber on the inside. Clearly they had decided that they couldn't rely on this method because they also had two padlocks.

Alex asked the man if I could take some photos inside the church and he agreed. It's not very often they give permission for photos inside a church. Besides, I'm not sure what the reason is for the ban. Surely it would be OK to take photos if you turn off the flash like I do.

On the way to the next attraction, we passed a funeral procession. There was a car at the front and then dozens of people walking behind. As usual we saw lots of horses and carts plus individuals walking along the road many of whom were carrying farming implements.

The next stop was a new monastary at Barsana. This consisted of several impressive new timber structures on the side of a hill. After Alex gave us an explanation of the monastery and showed us inside the church, he left us to roam around the site to take photos.

The big surprise was to find a large cage nearby that housed about 6 or 7 peacocks. The males were very busy trying to impress the females by spreading their feathers out wide. The females were ignoring them. It was the beginning of a productive photo expedition.

Alex then drove us to a brandy distillery at La Moara la Niculai which is a town near Vadu Izei where our guest house was. This stop wasn't on the original itinerary but Alex added it because Suzy expressed interest in seeing a distillery after she'd sampled several brandies at recent locations.

The distillery was on the edge of a stream flowing into a lake. One thing that was unusual about this location was that they use the stream as a carpet cleaning business.This consisted of two large tubs and two water wheels.

We stopped for lunch at Sighetu Marmatiei. We found a nice cafe that had access through an arched passageway to a pleasant open courtyard. Once again there was an open grill in the corner of the courtyard where the cooks were busy preparing meals.

We found a table under the tree. This time I ordered a Stella Artois beer.

Alex left us to enjoy our lunch while he went off to find a shop that sold a suitable memory card for my camera. Although I'd brought two spare 16GB cards (in addition to the original 16GB card), I feared I would run out of storage space before we got back to Bucharest.

There have been so many great photo opportunities on this trip - including the Insight bus trip and the Balkan Trails tour of Romania. I thought I was overdoing it by bringing two spare cards but it turned out that I needed more.

Alex had to go to several shops before he found an SDHC card with the right specifications. Even then, the shopkeeper gave him a Panasonic card from his personal assets rather than from the shop. It turned out to be much cheaper than buying it in Australia.

The waiters and waitresses at the cafe were all wearing traditional clothes and before we left I managed to get them to pose for a photograph.

After lunch we walked a short distance to the memorial museum to the victims of communism which consists of a jail where these prisoners were kept. You can see the small cells some of which have chains in the middle of the cells to restrain the prisoners. The cells are labelled with the names of prisoners including some leaders who died here.

Although it was a stark reminder of the dreadful things that were done under communist rule, it didn't have too many reminders of the executions and torture of other places we've visited. In other words, they've elected not to show the worst aspects.

Next we travelled to the Sapanta-Peri Monastery where the church has the tallest timber tower in Europe. The fact that it is a new monastery was obvious by looking the surrounding buildings that house the monks.

Many of the churches we've visited have a sombre feeling about them because they are surrounded by graves. Our next stop was different. It's called the Merry Cemetery. Here the gravestones are colourful and have a painting of the deceased person together with a poem about the person.

This tradition has been going now for several decades and is the work of one man who runs the cemetery. It's a popular spot where the entry fees go towards refurbishing the graves and rebuilding the church.

After visiting the church, we walked down the street to see the house of the man who creates the gravestones.

We got back to the guest house at about 5:30pm. Tonight there was going to be traditional folklore dancing and singing with our dinner. We were there on time at 7:30 and started our dinner but the entertainment didn't start until almost 8pm when an Indian couple (who are also on a Balkan Trails tour but one day behind us) arrived for dinner.

In the entertainment group, there were three male musicians, two male singers and dancers and two female singers and dancers. The girls were only young - probably about 15. One was prettier than the other. They included the audience in the show a couple of times by inviting us to dance with them.

This group wasn't as professional and entertaining as the folklore show we'd experienced in Poland. The songs were too long and repetitive. The drummer did not seem too enthusiast. Alex commented that the drummer he's seen previously with the group was much better and had given the show enthusiasm and liveliness.

After we went to bed, there was a thunderstorm. This was good timing because we'd been expecting rain all day because of the forecast. We'd taken our spray jackets in the car all day to be prepared for wet weather but we hadn't needed them.