Into the Carpathians: A Beautiful Drive to Moieciu de Sus

October 5, 2023October 5, 2023 Koen 0 Comments

This destination guide covers my road trip through the Carpathians to the beautifully located mountain village of Moieciu de Sus.

Road trip

After my visit to the beautiful Brancoveanu Monastery in Sâmbăta de Sus, I returned to my rental car and started driving again.

Even though my road trip was almost over, I still had nearly a whole afternoon left before I had to return my rental car in Brașov.

I decided to drive deeper in the Carpathians in order to enjoy some fine mountain scenery on this beautiful autumn day.

To be specific, I put the village of Moieciu de Sus in my GPS as I had seen some beautiful pictures of its surroundings before and had yet to visit it.

sambata de sus brancoveanu monastery — *Brancoveanu Monastery in Sambata de Sus. ©Paliparan*

transylvania road — *Back on the beautiful Transylvanian roads after my visit to the monastery. ©Paliparan*

Hills and rivers

To reach Moieciu de Sus (Upper Moieciu), I first drove on the 104A from the Brancoveanu Monastery to Șinca, where I took the junction onto the 73A towards Zărnești.

Once in Zărnești, it would be a short drive towards Bran and Moieciu de Jos (Lower Moieciu), where the road to Moieciu de Sus branches off and climbs up into the mountains.

The first stretch of the journey took me right alongside a small river through the scenic Carpathian foothills.

DN73a road romania — *On the DN73A towards Zărnești. ©Paliparan*

carpathian river — *River streaming through the Carpathian foothills. ©Paliparan*

Into the mountains

After a while, a series of hairpin turns indicated that I really started to climb up into the mountains.

At this point, some of the Carpathian peaks were already clearly visible in the distance.

As the road was almost completely absent of traffic, it made for some fun driving on these twisting roads.

mountain road — *The road climbs up higher in the mountains. ©Paliparan*

hairpin turn carpathians — *Hairpin turn in the Carpathians. ©Paliparan*

Autumn foliage

Although autumn colours were somewhat lacking so far during my mid-October road trip across Transylvania, they did for sure appear at higher altitudes in the mountains.

The autumn foliage along the road was stunning and I stopped at several places to take in the fine views.

scenery road carpathians — *Scenery along the road. ©Paliparan*

autumn foliage romania transylvania carpathians moieciu de sus — *Autumn foliage along the road. ©Paliparan*

autumn foliage romania transylvania — *Some more beautiful autumn colours. ©Paliparan*

haystacks hillside moieciu de sus romania carpathians — *Haystacks on the hillside. ©Paliparan*

Cheile Grădiștei

About halfway down the road between Moieciu de Jos and Moieciu de Sus there is a junction with a road splitting off on your right towards the Cheile Grădiștei mountain resort in Fundata.

You can clearly see where the name comes from, as Cheile means ‘gorge’ or ‘canyon’ in Romanian and the road does indeed take you through a beautiful river gorge.

Once you reach the end of the road you will find yourself in the resort on the mountaintop featuring a large chalet-style hotel and some smaller accommodation units.

There are also some restaurants as well as an Alpine coaster you can enjoy here, although the best of all are without a doubt the sweeping views over the mountains.

cheile Grădiștei moieciu de sus road trip — *Driving through the Grădiștei gorge. ©Paliparan*

carpathian mountains autumn moieciu de sus — *Wonderful view from the road over the forested mountains. ©Paliparan*

Cheile Grădiștei resort Fundata — *The Cheile Grădiștei resort in Fundata. ©Paliparan*

carpathians mountain resort — *View over the Carpathians from the mountain resort. ©Paliparan*

Into Moieciu de Sus

After some backtracking down the mountain, I found myself again on the road towards Moieciu de Sus, which follows the course of a small river through a forested gorge.

A while later, the valley widened out a bit and the first houses of the village of Moieciu de Sus appeared alongside the road.

forest road — *Heading down the mountain. ©Paliparan*

forest road romania — *Beautiful forest road. ©Paliparan*

mountain river forest — *The road follows the course of a mountain river. ©Paliparan*

A walk through town

Moieciu de Sus is just a small village and there isn’t really anything to see or do besides enjoying the fine mountain scenery.

The scenic location of the village inside a particularly picturesque valley of the Carpathian Mountains is however reason enough to come here.

By the looks of it, it seemed that many houses inside Moieciu de Sus were either holiday homes or pensions.

Indeed, if you are looking for a quiet and beautiful place to say in this part of the Carpathians, then Moieciu de Sus could certainly be a good option.

village houses carpathians — *Village houses. ©Paliparan*

houses moieciu de sus — *Houses in Moieciu de Sus. ©Paliparan*

houses hill — *Most houses seemed to have a rectangular strip of land behind them running up the hill. ©Paliparan*

moieciu de sus romania — *Moieciu de Sus. ©Paliparan*

Climbing up

The Carpathians offer ample opportunities for hiking, and also in Moieciu de Sus you can find numerous trails running into the mountains.

Sadly, I had little time for hiking in the Carpathians as I still needed to drive back to Brașov to return my rental car in time.

However, I did have some time to climb up the hillside, from where I enjoyed some sweeping views over Moieciu de Sus and the surrounding mountains.

footpath moieciu de sus carpathians — *From the main road, I followed a footpath up the hill. ©Paliparan*

hillside pastures — *Hillside pastures. ©Paliparan*

climb hill — *Climbing higher. ©Paliparan*

moieciu de sus carpathian mountains romania — *Gorgeous view over Moieciu de Sus and the Carpathian Mountains. ©Paliparan*

Driving back to Brașov

Having enjoyed some of the fresh mountain air and fine views, I again headed to my car for the drive back to Brașov.

Driving back from Moieciu de Sus to Moieciu de Jos along the same road, I had even better views of the spectacular rock formations lining the river gorge.

At Moieciu de Jos, I again joined the main road towards Brașov.

This road took me directly through the town of Bran, famous among tourists for its impressive castle situated on an outcrop.

Although the castle is without doubt stunning to look at, I think it’s one of the most overrated sights in Romania, mostly thanks to all the Dracula kitsch around it and the fact that historically it has absolutely zero to do with Vlad the Impaler, the man on whom the legend of Dracula is based.

I drove straight on to Brașov, where I returned my Dacia Sandero rental car without any issue whatsoever.

moieciu de sus jos road carpathians drive — *Driving back on the road from Moieciu de Sus to Moieciu de Jos. ©Paliparan*

gorge moieciu de sus cheile gradistei carpathians drive — *Impressive rock formations of the gorge. ©Paliparan*

bran roadside church — *Roadside church in Bran. ©Paliparan*

Evening walk in Brașov

As I still had some time left before the departure of my train back to Bucharest, I enjoyed a sunset stroll through the beautiful streets of Brașov.

I had a short walk through the city centre to Piața Sfatului, the central square of Brașov, and around the imposing Black Church.

Of course, I couldn’t resist to buy some kürtős, a sweet chimney cake covered with nuts.

Although you can see this chimney cake all over Central Europe, kürtős is originally a Transylvanian-Hungarian delicacy.

Brașov Piața Sfatului — *Piața Sfatului in Brașov. ©Paliparan*

Brașov main square — *Buildings on Brașov’s main square. ©Paliparan*

*Some yummy Kürtős to take home. ©Paliparan*

Dinner time

All the driving had made me hungry and thirsty, so I headed to the traditional cellar restaurant Sergiana for some authentic Romanian food.

I enjoyed a complimentary portion of jumări (pork cracklings) before delving into a delicious bean soup and some sarmale (cabbage rolls stuffed with meat), all washed away with an Ursus beer or two.

sarmale sergiana restaurant brasov — *Sarmale. ©Paliparan*

Back to Bucharest

After the delicious meal, I took a bus to Brașov’s railway station.

Fortunately, I didn’t had to wait for long.

Some 15 minutes after I had arrived, the evening train to my home town of Bucharest pulled into the station.

Brașov station — *Waiting for my train back to Bucharest at the station of Brașov. ©Paliparan*

Conclusion

I had a fun drive through the Carpathians during the final hours of my Transylvanian road trip, visiting the beautifully located village of Moieciu de Sus.

The roads were great to drive, being mostly devoid of traffic and having some gorgeous views from the window, also partly thanks to the autumn foliage.

I’d only wish I had some more time in the Carpathians to do some proper hiking as the blue autumn skies were highly inviting!

End of the trip

This article about my drive through the Carpathians towards the village of Moieciu de Sus and back to Brașov marks the end of this trip report covering the Saxon Fortified Churches of Transylvania and some other major sights in this Romanian region.

If you missed any of the previous chapters of this trip report, you can find the trip report index below.

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Trip report index

This article is part of the ‘Visiting the Saxon Fortified Churches of Transylvania‘ trip report, which consists of the following chapters: