Pictures from the Present Pass

 This is right at the tunnel entrance where a 900 meter tunnel goes through the top of the ridge - looks like it cuts off about the last 300 vertical meters over the top.  The parking lot that you see is only a small part of the chaos of people, stalls selling all kinds of stuff, and traffic.

If you want a panorama of the pass and the road that we cycled, go to:

http://www.360concept.ro/panorame/sibiu/transfagarasan/


 A smallish town with a church from the 13th century - I think that it's more impressive in its unrestored state than some of the restored churches.

 Romanians, Germans, Hungarians, Turks, Mongols were always fighting over this area, so their hero's provide lots of gist for the heroic statue mill.

 Funny bumper stickers in all languages.

 The vertical down to the plains in the background is 1800 meters - just under 6000 feet.  It's a steady climb the whole way, no level spots.  Nowhere in the US that I know of that is anything like that.  The top of the climb is  only 2050 meters (the pass is higher, with a tunnel going under the pass) - but with tree line well below that - maybe 4500 feet - not sure why treeline is so low.

 Looking up the valley from below - at the waterfall which comes down from treeline.  Very sharply cut valley - no obvious glaciation except in the cirques above treeline.  A tramway runs from below the waterfall up to the entrance of the tunnel.  In winter, the road is closed and the tramway (looks like only 10-12 people fit into each tram, and there appear to be only 2 trams) is the only access to the hotel at the tunnel.  Pictures on the wall show ski tracks on the snow - must be backcountry skiing - no ski lifts and the terrain below the hotel looks very unpalatable for skiing.

A sculpture in Alba Iulia of humans being ground up in the machine.

 A small orthodox monastery out in the countryside.

 The mountains to be climbed, looking ahead while cycling across the plains.

 Another larger Orthodox basilica.

 Climbing, climbing.

 Climbing some more.

When Jean and I get really old, perhaps we can learn to speak Romanian and move into this Romanian Senior Center.  The ad was interesting, and we saw quite  a few retirement homes in the course of our riding.

Today, we rode through the big tunnel (used the vans to "convoy" the cycles and light the way - sort of - for us).  Then down 6000 feet on the other side - with some shorter tunnels, though one longer steeply downhill tunnel was black enough to be rather terrifying - with essentially zero visibility.

After 2 days of nice weather, back into the heat and humidity.

Forest much lusher and obviously a wetter climate on the Southern side of the Carpathian ridge (and the forest goes on and on and on - 5 countries worth without a break, actually) and is thick and varied.  Onto the plains where the farms also look much more profitable with the wetter climate.