Pensiunea Manoir Mignon Suceava

... frescos. Each is surrounded by a fortification and flowers growing around its courtyard. In our last monastery, the nuns are beginning mass. They are chanting. It is only us as observers in the tiny interior. Pretty amazing.

Since the nuns get out rarely and transport costs are very high relative to local salaries, Monica turns out to be the transport provider for many of them as they send goods to/from their ...

... show the colors of fall, towns are fascinating reflections of other worlds …

The bus does not actually go to our destination, Suceava, but drops us off 30 minutes away. An older Romanian couple is doing the same transfer and helps us find the right bus to continue. This bus has to be flagged down from the main street.

In Suceava we are greeted by the owner of the hostel Monica. She does everything off season (reception, cleaning, giving of tours ...

... Nord ,
90 % din constructii sunt din lemn, nu doar case. Anumite tari ca
Japonia sau SUA, impun construirea de case de lemn in zonele unde
cutremurele de pamant sunt frecvente, pentru ca lemnul este materialul
de constructie care rezista cel mai bine la cutremure.








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... distinctive because they are painted on the outside as well as on the inside. They are rather unique and charming and we had the good fortune of visiting some of the most famous: Putna, Voronet, Sucevita and Moldovita. To do that, we had to drive around rural roads, in a bucolic region where the houses are new, huge and gorgeous, but where the local people still dress like they did a century ...

... in that painting. Nor does it have anything to do with members of the gentler sex being the guardians of hell. It might be that the Orthodox priests weren't comfortable with all these nuns running the place. Painted monasteries are very nice. But mostly it's the settings - like the absolute magic of a Japanese temple settled in the mist of mountains and pine trees, these places are sublime. So quiet and peaceful - except for all the funny dogs!!

... We piled into Monika's van and set off through beautiful countryside towards the first monastery, me dozing off now and then and missing half the glory. In the 15th and 16th centuries, assorted rulers built some beautifully painted monasteries in the surrounding foothills. Every square inch of the interior and exterior was covered with paintings in the Byzantine style (skinny people, no 3D perspective ...

... to install a plate in a young man's foot. The foot is turned almost backward due to a birth defect and in a few weeks he will be walking with a pretty normal stride. The docs are truly miracle workers in the eyes of the Romanians and I am in awe. These people give up a week or more of their very lucrative practices to come to the poorest and most needy people at their own expense and provide care to people who earn in a year what some people earn in a week. I ...

... simply because the elements have taken their toll to a far greater extent. Still, the site is a beautiful one, even if it doesn't quite share the same magnificence as Sucevita, Voronet and the others. The woman caretaker inside was friendly and talked with me a bit about the monastery (albeit in Romanian). Once I'd had a good look through the interior, I thought I'd ask her if she knew a good way to get back to Suceava. There was nothing direct, she confirmed, but there were maxitaxis ...

... here (http://www.romanianmonasteries.org/all churches.html), claiming it was his favorite site in Europe (I think). Today five of us went on a tour of four of the monasteries, hosted by Monika. There are painted frescoes both inside and outside the monastery, depicting different Bible stories for the then-illiterate populace. The inside depicts different martyrs and the nasty way they met their maker in graphic ...

... in, so we could pay, there it was. It was big and painted. 3/4's of it was in good condition with stories of Adam and Eve and Genesis, but not being religious, I just thought that they were pretty !!!!! There were more inside, but they were being restored at the time, so we could not see much. Once done, we had the walk back. We started and thought that some good soul pick us up. It did not happen. The 6 K's went by pretty fast. We walked the 1.5 K's into town ...