Predeal - Romania

Predeal is a small town located in the Carpathian mountains just south of Brasov and just north of Sinaia. You can get to "Dracula's castle" in Bran in about a half an hour by car. Even more impressive is the nearby Rasnov fortress with a beautiful view over the valley below.

Predeal is also one of Romania's bigger ski restorts, but as you can see from these photos it also makes for a nice summer retreat. At the railway station, there are a few leftover signs from the Communist era. This statue below certainly counts as one...




The Predeal ski slopes in mid-summer. It's nice to escape Bucharest and get out into nature on days like this.
A view north looking up the Carpathian ridge toward Brasov.

A view South with the town of Predeal in the background.

A typical street scene in the upper parts of the city. Predeal is built on a hill and the roads stretch up about two miles before the pavement stops and the hiking trails through the mountains begin.

Random fields near the slopes on a hot summer day.


More views of Carpathian mountain nature. The mountains are still filled with bear, lynx, deer, and the very occasional wolf. You can see samples of various prize winning species at the Carpathian hunting museum outside Sinaia. Cafe life downtown on Predeal's main street as seen below.


A view from the railway station looking up the hillside.
More views from along the railway tracks below.

Alpine style hotels are typical in the region. Predeal is quiet in summer but packs with skiiers and winter sports enthusiasts once the first snow falls.



A typical style house in Predeal. The town is fast becoming an expensive destination resort, but only a few years ago it remained fairly sleepy.

The "After Dark" bar isn't as exciting as the name sounds, but it's a good place to grab a beer.

The Bella Predeal is our restaurant of choice up here. The food is good. The service is great.

A Brancovean style Romania building below.

More of the older cottage style pensions.

Ski slopes wait for winter....

A modern style Protestant church dominates the Predeal skyline.

A view from our window....

Getting rid of old furniture isn't usually difficult in rural Romania. There are always takers. In this case, however, the horse carts came to pick it up.


You'd actually be amazed how much stuff you can fit in a horsecart!

Mamaia - Romania

My wife and I are in the process of renovating our place in Mamaia. Below are a few photos of our seaside apartment. We're looking forward to visitors later this summer... A view of Mamaia from our living room window. In the background the Black Sea meets the Romanian coastline in Mamaia, forming an 8 kilometer beach filled with hotels, restaurants, and more or less scantily clad beach-goers.
A slightly wider angle from our living room window.

The living room itself below. (Rather spartan, no?) Check out the "red rum" walls.

The lake in front in called Tabacaria - and the remaining trees are what is left of Tabacaria Park. The small narrow strip of land you see in the far background is what divides the city of Constanta from the beach resort of Mamaia.

More views...

Looking south toward the city of Constanta.

Bedroom pic.

Entrance way. As you can see, we need to get the floors done.

A close-up view looking south down Tabacaria Park toward Constanta.

The kitchen...

View from the living room window. You can walk to the Black Sea beach in about 10 minutes if you go through Vacation Village. Vacation Village is pretty much what it sounds like - imagine a local carnival atmosphere (complete with lots of carnie types) with low budget rides, games, etc.

A view on to our street - for now. We expect crappy development much sooner rather than later.

Below, a view from our kitchen window...

Montenegro - Budva & Saint Stefan

Last March, I attended a regional Country Director's meeting for my organization in Budva, Montenego. Flying into Montenegro on a two propeller plane was fairly fascinating and somewhat unnerving due to the high winds. We crossed over the Adriatic Sea and the mountains just jumped out as us. Montenegro is a stunningly beautiful location. One we arrived in Podgorica we set out for the coast by car
Beautiful scenic backdrops dominate the landscape as the mountains meet the sea.

A view of the oldtown of historic Budva.

A view from our resort. Much of the Montenegro's coastline is currently being developed. Russian money is coming in to build luxury resorts, casinos, and hotels. Like their Serbian neighbors, Montenegrians speak a Slavic language similar to Russian and are fellow Orthodox Christians. The mountainous location and isolation of the country kept it from Ottoman rule and allowed it to remain more or less autonomous for centuries. It was later incorporated into Yugoslavia as one of the nation's six republics.

This is the elite luxury resort island of Saint Stefan. Once an upscale resort for European elite during the Yugoslav era - Sophian Loren supposedly frequently visited - the small island resort of Saint Stefan is now undergoing a major rennovation. The King's beach is located on the right. It's called the King's beach because the royal family used this location as their summer residence.

A small sleepy fishing village also serves as a tourist destination. This was the view a few yards from our hotel.

The rocky coastline extends down the Adriatic Sea from Croatia to Albania. I noticed the hills in Montenegro were slightly more forested than in neighboring Croatia, and ths seem less bleech white in color. Most of the trees along the Dalmatain Coast were cut down by the Ottomans and the Venetians, when the great trading empire of Venice ruled the seas.

Georgia on my Mind

Last winter I was part of an ENEMO-OSCE presidential election observation mission to the Republic of Georgia. Here I am below with our tanslator Guliko. Ironically, we were sent to a mostly Azeri area in southern Georgia where few of the locals actually knew Georgian. My Russian was better Guliko's so a few times I ended up translating for myself.

This was the polling station from hell. How many people can you pack into a precinct hallway? Apparently, a lot!

Getting out was madness. I'm amazed people were not killed.

It snowed heavily on election day, adding to the chaos. The roads were covered in a foot of snow and we had to limit our observations to populated areas outside Tiblisi.
This is Maria, my colleague from Romania. She is funny as hell. We enjoyed a huge Georgian lunch in a restaurant with little in the way of heating. Her incredible sense of humor kept me laughing the whole time. Georgian food is fantastic by the way. Khinkali would go over big time in the USA. They are a sort of massive sized meat filled dumplings. Khachapuri is the national bread with cheese melted on top. Toasting and wine are very important in Georgian culture. There is also an ancient Georgian tradition called a supra led by a tamada who tells stories and entertains while guests eat and drink. It's more complicated than that, but that's what Google is for if you are interested.
Infrustructure is rather primative, at least far more than I imagined it would be. The schools mostly had small wood or coal burning stoves. This picture brings back memories of when I lived in the USSR in 1991. In Sochi at that time they had the same kind of toilets. Not pretty stuff.

In Sochi in 1991, I came down with a horrible case of food poisoning. All we had were toilets like these, and this was a nice one by comparision. Ah memories...
A picture of election officials gathered around the stoves I mentioned earlier. Most of the population of this precinct was Azeri.

At 3:00 am we were still counting ballots. Fraud? Incompetence? Who knows, but the roads were getting totally snowed under so we had to assume the best. At 5:00 am we arrived back home in Tiblisi, after our car broke down. A long day...