Tuesday 8th July 2008 – Mamaia-Sat, Constanta, Romania

The lady at the Madara campsite didn't speak any English but she was very friendly and always smiling – she even gave us a chocolate each when I paid the bill last night. She came out the morning to wave us off and we retraced our route passed the cliffs to the motorway.
On the way to the coast we were distracted by the site of Pobiti Kamuni, signposted from the motorway and shown as an 'other curiosity' on our map. It was only 4km off the road and it turned out to be a very worthwhile diversion. Pobiti Kamuni is an area of limestone columns. They were formed over 50 million years ago when a layer of limestone overlaid a beach. Over the years, water percolated through the limestone, washed away the sand below it and then the columns formed in the same way that stalactites and stalagmites form in caves. Eventually, the limestone layer and the sand were eroded leaving the columns in place. Walking over sand between these columns it is possible to see that some are hollow and others, where the surface has become detached, show an interior composed of stalactites. Of course, many of the formations have names such as 'The Devil' (because it had many different faces), The Family (because they wore dark glasses carried guns and drove black cars – only kidding) and the Magic Circle. We were told the history by the custodian and he also informed us that it was an area of high positive energy. If we walked through the columns in bare feet, it would dissipate our negative energy and we would be energised. The latter is certainly true, as the sand was so hot that we would have been dancing, trying to keep our feet off the sand. We declined the offer of a souvenirs that contained sand from the magic circle or “Bulgaria's gold, the most valuable in the world” - actually rose extract from the area near Shipka. It takes thousands of kilos of rose petals to produce a litre of the rose extract – they should have left the petals on the roses as far as I am concerned!
Varna is a large city on the Black Sea coast and is very popular Bulgarian holidaymakers. Recently it has also become a popular, cheap package destination for Western European tourists. It didn't hold much attraction for us, especially given the difficulty of finding campsites, so were moving on to Romania.
Just outside Varna, we came to a sign to the monastery of Aldzha. It being lunchtime, we were looking for somewhere to stop so we drove the 1km off our road to the site. After lunch we went into the site of the cave monastery and its associated catacombs. The catacombs could only be viewed through metal bars and weren't very interesting but the monastery was well presented. The rooms of the monastery consisted of artificial caves dug into the cliff on different levels, originally connected by stairs constructed in the cliff. A metal staircase had been built on the outside of the cliff allowing access to all of the rooms. Simply labelled with pictures showing the purpose of each room (monk's cell, refectory, church, crypt etc.), it was easy to understand how the monks lived.
Even more than yesterday, this was the day of the sunflowers. Huge fields of the flowers were evident on the whole of our journey, especially between Varna and the border with Romania. This area was dominated by very large farms, obviously highly mechanised, a great contrast to the poorer areas of the country where only human and animal labour was in evidence.
We had been told by Bulgarians and fellow travellers that we would go back in time as soon as we crossed the border into Romania. Not so! On the Bulgarian side of the border it was very sparsely occupied but as soon as we crossed into Romania we were into bustling villages, towns and ports. The settlements had intriguing names – we drove through '2nd May', passed Saturn, Venus, Jupiter and Neptun and then drove through '23rd August'! The towns named after the planets were all Black Sea resorts.
We drove through the busy city of Constanta and out on to the sand spit of Mamaia. This toll road lead to Mamaia-Sat and our chosen campsite of Popas Hanul Piratilor. We chose this site because it had 2,000 touring pitches, so we were sure that there would be one available. There wasn't – the site had closed! However just a hundred metres away was the much simpler-named Camping S, it was open and had space – we drove in. There is no such thing as 'pitches', you just park where you like. It took us a little time to find a suitable place but we soon settled in. There was very little shade anywhere but the temperature is much more pleasant here and there is a breeze off the sea, so shade is not so important. What a contrast to Bulgarian campsites – excellent modern shower blocks, shops and restaurant and a very good, fine-sand beach. Incidentally, the Black Sea is nor black, it is most definitely blue!
Given that we had driven 240km and stopped twice, it was quite late and we couldn't face cooking, so we had a meal at the campsite restaurant. Simple meals, not typical Romanian cuisine (we hope) but filling and good value for money.
Photos: An overview of the stone columns of Pobti Kamuni; The Pobti Kamuni 'Fertility Stone' described to us as “Bulgarian Viagra”; The Aldzha Monastery.