Last night's stopover was, by some margin, the most peaceful stopover we've ever encountered in Romania. Only some really odd and slightly disturbing animal noises emanating from the adjoining woodland just as we were dropping off to sleep broke an otherwise silent (but for cicadas and quail) night.
Come morning. Emma retrieved the trail cam that - given the habitat - she'd only half-heartedly set up and... wowzers! At 22:48 last night a European wildcat passed us by and was caught on the camera. The mystery of the really odd and slightly disturbing animal noises was seemingly solved.
It would seem this is a genuinely significant sighting. A bit of research revealed that there are probably only 2000 individuals known throughout Romania and populations seem to be concentrated in the Carpathian mountains and Danube basin. The animal we captured is probably at the extremities of known range and we'll certainly be passing the info to the relevant Romanian conservation authorities upon our return. What a result!
And so, to today. We only had about an hour's potter to do before reaching the Romania-Moldova border and found it to be a pretty chilled and extremely atypical Romanian experience. The roads were quite, inhabitants sparse and landscapes very much agricultural.
Shortly before hitting the border I picked up a few provisions at the last unfathomably-named 'supermarket' in Romania (we'd long-since passed the comforting familiarity of Lidls), and therein struggled to spend the heady sum of £7.43 on more groceries and tins of fearsomely strong lager than I could comfortably carry.
To the border, then. Well, it was a fairly drawn-out affair, all told. The (male) Romanian official who (eventually) released us from Romania was one of those otherwise-impotent, strutting-jobsworth types who was probably bullied at school; whilst the (female) Moldovan official who (eventually) accepted us was a more professional but still suitably hostile and dour guardian of her country's safety, rules and regulations: at first...
With her, we somberly trotted through the various passport, driving licence / vehicle ID (V5C) / green card / reason for visit / Moldovan vignette (already pre-purchased, hah!) procedures; before she sourly demanded to look inside the box.
Emma let her in and everything immediately changed. She actually whooped, broke into a huge grin, and shouted something Moldovan back to her (initially) equally hostile profession guardians of the country's safety, rules and regulations. At this point three of them came to take a gander at the fit out and immediately entered into a world of happy-faced incomprehensible chatter. Whatever it was that had cheered them up, within minutes thereafter we were on our way and on Moldovan soil. Or rather Moldovan excuses for roads.
Yup, they're in a pitiful state. Or at least the ones we've seen so far are. Bumpy, potholed and randomly maintained / neglected seems to be the order of the day. These are definitely shock absorber eaters.
We bumped and bounced for about fifty miles before calling it a day and formed some initial impressions as we went. The country, so far, is certainly less manic and less obviously peopled than Romania. There's seemingly not as much in the way of desperate poverty here. There's also less of a public display of ostentatious wealth. The roads are less trafficked and the general infrastructure, including housing and commercial buildings, are pretty unremarkable. It's altogether much less shouty and in your face than most of Romania. Landscapes are mainly rolling and arable.
By mid afternoon we were cooking in the relentless heat so decided to look for a stopover. It didn't take too long before we found a suitable track which, once we'd bounced passed what appeared to be a nearby village's accepted fly-tipping area, is all rather pleasant. We're overlooking a mix of arable, bushy scrub, trees and a water body (pic).
Luckily, within minutes of arriving the skies suddenly darkened and distant electrical storms became evident. Respite from the fearsome sun lent itself to a run apiece but poor old Emma (who went second) only managed about 750 metres before one of the distant storms became her own personal storm. Flashes of forked lightning, overhead thunder and an instant full-on soaking saw her slipping and sliding down the now-cloying mud track back to the truck with all haste.
It was a pitiful sight. She was soaked, bedraggled and literally caked in mud from head to toe. Quite how she'd managed to get so filthy in two minutes of trying to stay clean is beyond me. She wasn't very happy, so I couldn't pretend to be. I helped with the cleanup operation, which between us quite literally took about twenty minutes. Only then was she in a fit enough state to climb aboard and get a shower. I think we need to add a wife-friendly pressure washer to our equipment and systems inventory.
No unusual wildlife sightings from here but there has been a warbler knocking about that's beyond my ability to ID. I did also catch a glimpse of what appeared to be a black fox. The most likely explanation is that it was a feral dog. Like Romania, there seem to be many here.
Unlike Romania, though, the whole time we've been here we've been left blissfully alone. No shepherds, no gringos, no lollygaggers, no people milling about doing weird / nefarious things. Yet...
Post composed at 22:15 on Wednesday 6th August from our intended overnighting spot N 47.69032°, E 27.97545° / http://maps.google.com/maps?q=loc:47.69032%2C27.97545