Budapest Hotel Chisinau

... along with the price of oil, too. The bear may still have a growl or two left.

I’m hesitant to cross borders on Sunday for fear of getting stuck with no currency and no food, but those fears turn out to be unfounded. The mini-bus from Iasi to Chisinau pulls into the bus station amid the biggest mob of people I’ve ever seen. It’s the market, too, and there are forex booths by the dozen. Score one ...

... Chisinau wandering the wide, leafy boulevards and pleasant parks. We cooked dinners at the hostel as we had a kitchen practically to ourselves and we discovered the central vegetable market where old Moldovan women would flock with the produce of their gardens. We complemented this with cheap local booze from the supermarket in the nearby, superbly-named, shopping centre 'Mall-Dova'.


Our original onward plans to get to ...

... combination, gas cooking, all rest electrical, all kitchen and cooking utensils, 5 spots in ceiling, nice black tiles floor Dining area: glass dining table 140x80cm with chairs, nice black tiles floor, airco power 55m2 Sitting area : sofa combination 3 + 1, low glass table, a large black smoked ...

... city was to store and season high quality wines. The place is also wonderfully decorated and has a scenic beauty of its own. There are wine cellars in the galleries which are made of lime stone inside this Milestii Mici Winery. These galleries are forty meters to eighty-five meters deep. The total length of the galleries is an astonishing two hundred kilometers and a little more than fifty kilometers of the gallery is built specially ...

... the city of Chisinau. The city is beautiful - wide streets, green trees, with a real throbbing energy to it. We can't wait to get out into the city this morning! Chisinau Day by Mike Adrian and I stayed overnight at the Vita Verdi Hotel, owned by a Rotarian in the Chisinau club. The previous evening we spent time with the president of the Club Ion Mardarovici. He very kindly drove us around the city, which is on seven hills, has very wide streets lined ...

... and we sought our carriage. It is very hard to communicate, but it turned out that what had arrived was half of our train, and the half we wanted would be along soon. 'Soon' being an hour and a few more degrees later, and while our winter clothing is quite good, it did lead one very nice and funny old lady to point at Claude shivering, then unzip her jacket and make like she was sweating and too hot. Quality comedy, appreciable even as your heartrate ...

... We had to go to Chisinau via Vienna as it was the only flight that would get us there at the right time. It was a fairly uneventful flight, and we felt very special as we got ushered direct from the plane into the VIP lounge and a woman assured us she would retrieve out luggage - as arranged by Ghenadi and Illya, the people Les was there to meet with. Our special feeling faded quickly when the people who were retrieving our luggage for us came with the ...

... close-up shots of the other Jewish men that I wouldn't have the balls to go up and do. They ended up giving me a free kosher lunch, although it took a good 20 minutes of uncomfortably sitting there wondering what to do. But no complaints at all for sure - it was a totally unexpected display of hospitality for someone that was nothing more than a curious, non-Jewish sightseer. It would have been nice if I had been able to communicate with the Russian-speakers more ...

... dumped off on a side street by the bus driver because "I got you here 2 hours early now don't let me get caught and get in trouble" - trolley buses getting tangles in their overhead wires, making it rain sparks Moldova was just strange: - people squatting on the ground everywhere - very odd old king all over the money - people taking their cows on morning walks

... an amount. She made me take out the money and count it in her presence so there I was fumbling to hide the undeclared excess! Anyway I had to then write out the counted amount on the customs form and we do the balance sheet when I leave the country and any discrepancies will be duly noted and confiscated! If I don't make it home in three weeks you know I've been detained for failing to declare. I finally made it into Moldova, and for those of you who are as ...