Transylvania 101: Visiting a friend
About a year after our exceptional journey to Norway, I ended up visiting my good friend Daniel in his hometown of Mediaș. Located in the central Transylvania, Mediaș is quite far away from my hometown of Baia Mare in the north-west. Since I wasn’t keen on driving the chaotic Romanian roads, I had to go by train. A very slow train without air conditioning that heats up like a tin can left in the scorching summer sun. Good old Eastern Europe…
It was my first time visiting that part of the country. On day one, after the gruelingly long train ride, we set out to explore the rolling green hills and medieval remnants surrounding Mediaș. The weather was excellent. Sunny and warm, just perfect for sightseeing and outdoor buffoonery. It was a day of reconnaissance, forest exploration and medieval sword flinging. It was also a day of complete clumsiness, on my end, due to the long, tiresome, trip to Mediaș.
Treasure hunting
We visited the town of Moșna and its fortified medieval church. In the courtyard, we took our time, looking around for artifacts and treasure. This place is so full of history that apparently one can still find small overlooked artifacts in the soil.
In our endeavor, we found a rusty old nail in the dirt. The nail told the story of past battles where great armies crashed into the fortified walls like the raging waves of the seven seas colliding with unrelenting rocky shores. The forces unleashed were so great that they knocked the nails straight out of the opposite sides of the walls! On the other hand, it could have just been someone misplacing a nail in more modern times.
In our search for the truth, we found another piece of the puzzle: a shattered piece of pottery. Using our professional deductive abilities, we concluded that this fragment obviously implied that even the pots flew off of the shelves when the battle raged on the other side of the walls. Before heading back to Mediaș, we stopped by the local woods to test out Daniels new acquisition: a glorious Viking sword. Being my first time flinging around a sword, I had a fun time with it. The surrounding bushes and ghosts never stood a chance!
Where to next?
Arriving back in Mediaș, just before sundown, we hiked up a nearby hill and enjoyed a few beers in the wilds. It wasn’t long before we became the wilds… We had to find a purpose for our empty beer cans, so Daniel’s airsoft handgun gave them new purpose. I was quick to show my prowess in both ranged and close quarter shooting, missing every conceivable and inconceivable shot. In my defense, I was tired… The alcohol didn’t seem to help either.
As the evening set in, we packed up and went back to Daniel’s house for a well deserved meal and rest. The next day we planned to take a road trip to the Făgăraș Mountains, Romanian’s tallest mountains.