Maramures – 10 things to see and do in the beautiful Northern Romanian region

A holiday in Maramureş is not a simple thing to achieve if you’re coming by car from southern Bucharest. Crossing Romania by car, from south to north, as the highways are developing very slowly, is a difficult task. But the mirage of this very interesting region that you’ve always heard of good things makes you get over every road obstacle, set your GPS up north, and go kilometer by kilometer to the dreamland where you have to get to at least once in your life.

What to do and see in Maramureş? What are the best places to visit in Maramureş? These are normal questions for a newcomer, but beyond them, in Maramureş, something else prevails. Maramureş is a vast landscape painting that you can’t get enough of. It’s one of Romania’s most beautiful and balanced landscapes that will convey permanent well-being. Below, you will have a look at ten of the Maramureş highlights. There are certainly others, but those I left for a future visit. So, here are 10 places to see and things to do in Maramureş:

10 Enjoy color samples at The Blue Lake 

The Blue Lake is a special lake in Europe because it changes color depending on the season and how the sun hits on its surface. I visited this lake in the summer and was a bit disappointed. First of all, because the color was green at the beginning of August. A dirty green that does not honor his name. But people say it’s good to visit it in the spring when it is blue (light or dark). I take their word and envy them, leaving the photos raw, avoiding changing the water’s real color.

But why does Blue Lake change colors? Formed at the beginning of the 20th century by the collapse of some mine galleries, the lake has a special environment. Its water is very rich in sulfur content, with sulfide mineralization with copper ions, which gives it a greenish-blue color, changing depending on outdoor temperatures or sunlight.

Blue Lake is reached from Baia Sprie, where you can drive to a point, beyond the Catholic Church, on an unpaved road. You leave the car at the edge of the forest and then climb through the woods, on a pretty steep path marked by the blue cross, for 25-30 minutes. At some point, you discover the small lake (40 m from one bank on the other). There are more wooden tables on the shore where you can rest and possibly eat. Although the chemical content of the lake indicates a large amount of sulfur and even sulfuric acid, it is said that it is not dangerous to swim in the lake that is 4 meters deep. I didn’t try, so I don’t guarantee.

There are enough legends about this lake (as in many other parts), one of them saying that the mine below is very deep and that its flooded galleries endanger the nearby town of Baia Sprie itself. It’s just a legend, okay?

9 Admire traditional architecture and speak with a moroşan in the Sârbi village

Between the villages of Budești and Călinești, near Ocna Şugatag, there is the village of Sârbi, which in the 15th century was part of Văii Cosăului principality, the first documentary maintenance being in 1459. On the way to Sighetul Marmaţiei, Săpânţa or Bârsana, stop for at least half an hour here, more precisely at the gate of the house next to which there is a panel that says “Ensemble of popular technical architecture.”

You will first discover a series of old machines: a thresher, a mill, a sawmill, a plank, etc. It is kind of an open-air museum, and you will find out more after crossing the Maramures wooden gate and entering the household of Gheorghe Opriş, “traditional creator”, owner of this museum, settled by himself. Nea Opriş, an old man dressed in simple clothes, with a clop on his head and a serious face, struggles to mount a little wooden ladder inside a bottle.

This will be continued by filling the bottle with palinka (the strong spirit made from plums or pears) and selling it. “Is it better if it’s with a ladder inside? What’s the point?” “Well, you know how much you drink. When you finish the bottle, it’s like you get off the ladder, and you’re about to rest.”

This is not the only demonstration of old Opris. While you look around, breathing the air from the chamber where the horinca is made (a palinka version) or admiring the huge outdoor kitchen, the old man arrives in a room where his wife has already arranged on the table a few glasses of palinka and afinata (sweet cranberries spirit). “Come to the disco!” she urges you, on the rhythms of nea Opris, who beats in a drum and sings a traditional song.

It’s the little show of a man who worked hard to provide those who step on his threshold a corner of rural Maramureş, as he knows. There are more things to see in Gheorghe Opriş home, and you will certainly not regret the half-hour spent here. And sure enough, you’ll smile on your way out when the old man drives you and shows you his faucet of palinka at the gate. “For those in a hurry…”

8 Imagine a horror movie filmed at the Holy Archangels church in Breb village

On the same route between Budești and Călinești, making a small deviation on a road where you stop for once to photograph the idyllic landscape, you end up in Breb, a village apparently without any tourist virtue. And yet, scouting well, you will give, in a dead-end (on the Valley of Houses), over a wooden church, called Archangels Michael and Gabriel. A beautiful church, which I found out was built in 1531 in the village Copăciş (today disappeared) and moved in the 17th century in Breb.

The church has a Maramures architecture, but it seems left in a state of degradation. I didn’t get a chance to visit inside because it was closed. Still, I found out that there’s a painting made in 1629, mainly destroyed within the repairs made in 1866, and also some valuable wooden icons and an old bell from the 18th century.

Near the church, there is the parish house, now deserted, former priest Mircea Antal, which left a solid spiritual mark for the village’s inhabitants. The wooden house was built in 1904 and is a spectacular sample of local architecture, but, as I said, it is uninhabited and entered into a degradation state. You can cross the threshold, and the feeling that overwhelms you is more like you stepped into an atmosphere of a horror movie set: the rooms where old objects belonging to owners still make their life transmit strange vibrations in the oppressive silence of the place. For the whole picture, the nearby cemetery counts most wooden crosses in Maramureş, some of them extremely old.

Breb is one of the villages in Maramureş that will conquer you on the spot. Its name comes from a missing animal (the breb was a European beaver species), and the magnetism of the place has conquered, apparently, Prince Charles of England. He bought here two wooden houses. If you choose to stay in Breb for your Maramures holiday, do not forget that from here you can visit the Creasta Cocosului (Rooster’s Crest), from the Gutâi Mountain, a rock formation perfectly defined by the name it bears.

7 Venture to the Horses Waterfall

To reach the Horses Waterfall, you must first get to Borşa, the tourist resort located east of Maramureş County, near the Rodna Mountains National Park. Borşa is a town appreciated especially by winter sports lovers, nearby there are several quality slopes (the most important – Runc-Stiol, which has a length of 2 km) but also a natural trampoline (with a length of 90 m) intended for those who dare to “fly” on skis. Otherwise, there are many hostels, hotels and, generally speaking, it is a (too) quiet place in the summer.

From Borşa, more precisely from the Tourist Complex, you have two variants to reach the Horses Waterfall, located at an altitude of 1300 m. If your feet keep you walking, follow the route marked with a red triangle (about 2 hours). If you’re lazy enough, climb with a chairlift, which works both in summer and winter (its schedule starts at 9, the last race is at 17.00). I chose this last option after then I went through the forest for about 20 minutes to reach the highest water fall in Romania: 90 meters, divided into several steps.

Horses Waterfall is not necessarily impressive by the volume of water (sure, it also depends on the moment you visit it and the flow from that period), but by the natural location. The water gathers in a glacial circus before falling into thin air over the limestone called the Horses Bridge. Like any respectable place, this waterfall has its legend (although some say that the event was real). This reveals that the place’s name comes from the fact that in the old days, more horses from local herds were cornered by a bear, during a storm, precisely on the edge of the plateau where the waterfall is formed today. Scared and helpless, the horses have only the option to throw themselves into the void, losing sight of the hunted bear. Following this tragedy, people baptized several places in the area in memory of their horses: Horse Bridge, Horse Waterfall, Horse Spring, Horse Mountain. Many power… horses in this place.

6 Visit Sighetu Marmatiei

On the way to the merry cemetery of Săpânţa, you will pass through Sighetu Marmaţiei, a city about which in childhood we were jokingly calling it “the place where the map hangs in the nail.” A truth, as the city of 40,000 inhabitants is right near the border with Ukraine (the map also clings there). Sighetu Marmatiei was first mentioned in 1326 (the town was called Sighet until 1964) and had a rough history, marked by several events. First on this black list is the one in 1950 when many models of the Romanian elites opposing the new communist regime were imprisoned here: ex-ministers, leaders of historical political parties, generals, academicians, writers, bishops of the greek catholic church, etc.

As a result, today, one of the city’s main tourist attractions is the Memorial of the Victims of Communism and of the Resistance, near the City Hall. The former prison was transformed into a museum, a pain memorial that recreates and analyzes the tragic past of those dark Romanian years. The Memorial is founded by Ana Blandiana and Romulus Rusan, and the Sighet Museum is arranged by the Center of Studies, which has its headquarters in Bucharest. It is open from 9.30, and the visiting fee is 6 lei.

Sighetu Marmaţiei is an interesting, animated city that also proposes other more cheerful objectives. Among them, the Maramureşan Village Museum, an open-air museum housing some monuments of peasant architecture, but also the Ethnographic Museum of Maramureş, with exhibitions of traditional objects, glass, and wood icons, parts of folk costumes, etc.

5 Take a ride with the Mocăniţa steam train

Mocăniţa is a top attraction in Maramureş. An overrated one, in my opinion, but essentially sympathetic. Since 2000, this steam train has been running on the Vaser Valley, from spring to autumn. A route of 21.6 km, to Paltin, through the middle of a beautiful landscape, made with a slow train with wooden seats that will shake you a bit during the two-hour ride.

The train leaves from Viseul de Sus, and if you want to get tickets… well, the process is quite complicated and convoluted, generated by the Forest Railways Viseul de Sus, whose site is so poorly made that it misleads people. No more explanations – maybe the things will change in-between. I just add that prices are too high for the type of entertainment offered (57 lei / adult in season, 95 lei, with table).

Anyway, the children will be delighted to take a ride with Mocanita. Try to choose a warm day (give up if it rains!). Eventually, try to get seats in an open wagon and do not have very high expectations for this ride. The train has three stops. The final one, from Paltin, will last an hour and a half. There you have nothing to do but eat (steaks and sausages are made on the grills), take pictures of locomotives, or visit the small railway museum. The Vaser Valley is beautiful and wild, the silence of nature is interrupted only by the whistling iron horse, and certainly, the pictures you take will turn into beautiful memories.

4 Climb the St. Stephen Tower in Baia Mare

Many will probably not include a visit to Baia Mare in their program, considering it is of minor touristic importance. However, the truth is the opposite: Baia Mare is a reference point for Maramureş. Recently, the rehabilitation and promotion plan of cultural and historical identity was completed with the Citadel Square and St. Stephen Tower, right in the city’s center. 

Baia Mare was founded as a medieval town in the early 14th century, some of the relics of that period being visible nowadays. In 1445 the town was under Hunyadi rule. A year later, Iancu of Hunedoara ordered the bell tower Saint Stephen’s construction to honor the victory at Ialomita against the Ottoman troops. The tower was to be finished by Matthias Corvin, son of Iancu, who became king of Hungary in 1458.

Today, the City Hall has rehabilitated the area of the Citadel Square, which became a rectangular court dominated by the Sf. Stephen Tower and bordered by the Roman-Catholic Church of the Holy Trinity (built between 1717-1720), by the ruins of St. Martin, the ruins of St. Ecaterina and Degenfeld House, a historical monument from the 16th-17th century. The Roman-Catholic Church of St. Nicholas and the Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church are also there. Here you will discover a tourist information center and other buildings that fit perfectly into the landscape.

The star is definitely the St. Stephan Tower, a remnant of the great church with the same name. You will have a splendid 360-degree panorama over Baia Mare from the top of the tower. Up to its first level, you will climb on a narrow spiral staircase, and then you will discover the old clock’s mechanism, made by the Slovak master locksmith Jakab Lakatos in 1628. The access is then made on wooden stairs to the top of the tower measuring 50 meters, and the advice is not to climb at fixed hours because the sound produced by the exact time will kill your hearing.

The visiting program of St. Stepehn Tower is 8 – 16 (Monday – Friday) and 12 – 16 (Saturday and Sunday).

A good idea, after you relax in the Citadel Square (and take pictures including the red hand – the meaning of which I could not understand) is to start exploring Baia Mare, which seemed airy and beautiful, a new and old joint. Among the places I suggest to be visited here are the Butchers’ Bastion (the butchers’ guild was the strongest at some point in Baia Mare), Iancu de Hunedoara House (built in 1446, part of the old medieval castle) and the Planetarium (perfect for children, who will get information about planets and galaxies.)

One minute in St. Stephen’s Tower of Baia Mare:

3 Pray at Rohia Monastery

In the beautiful Land of Lăpuş (perhaps the most beautiful area in Maramureş, regarding the landscape), about 50 km from Baia Mare, there is a lovely monastery, built in a complicated natural context, on the top of a hill, in the middle of beech and oak forests: St. Anna – Rohia Monastery. It is one of the most beautiful places in Maramureş, some saying that it is more beautiful even than the monastic complex of Bârsana. Hard to make such rankings, but in all cases, Rohia is definitely a different place from Bârsana. And that, maybe, because of the location.

This monastery is known mainly for the miraculous icon of the Virgin Mary (made by Father Nicanor, from Mount Athos). Knowing of it, thousands of parishioners come to worship annually, around the 15th of August. From a cultural point of view, Rohia Monastery is associated with Nicolae Steinhardt, writer and publicist, who moved here in 1979, asking to be a monk in exchange for arranging the 30,000 books gathered in an extensive collection. In fact, the library (now includes 40,000 volumes) is one of the great values of this monastery, including writings by Steinhardt and notebooks that belonged to Bishop Justinian.

Suppose you are lucky enough to catch the young guide monk. In that case, he will be happy to take you on a tour of the complex, which includes several buildings: The Oak House, the Abbot House, the House with Chapel, the Summer Altar, the Poet’s House, the Maramures Corner, the library, the house of Nicolae Steindhardt, the Museum, etc.

Rohia Monastery has no rich history behind it, this being rather sad. Priest Nicolae Gherman (1877-1959), a parish priest in the village in the early 20th century, had a girl, Anuţa, who died when she was only 10 years, in 1922.

A faithful woman suggested the priest listen to God’s voice, and, realizing that it is a divine call, he laid the monastery’s foundations in memory of his daughter. Two years of work lasted, from 1923 to 1925. A year later, it was consecrated. It was only a hermitage for several decades, unable to develop because of the difficult access. The enlargement came only after 1965.

2 Cheer up in the Merry Cemetery of Săpânţa

He was once a wood sculptor, Stan Ioan Pătraş on his name, at the same time poet and painter, who came, in 1935, with a great idea: to set up a cemetery where the crosses will funnily narrate the summary of the deceased’s life. The man began to carve oak wood crosses, on which he wrote a few rhymes about the dead, painted them in blue, and, in their upper part, made a suggestive drawing related to a moment in the life of the man who passed away. And there we have the Merry Cemetery of Sapanta!

A naive, direct, funny style – Stan Pătraș wanted to sweeten the moment of death. Over time, the crosses multiplied, and the cemetery became a real tourist attraction, being more and more visited. In 1977, Pătraș died, but his work was continued by an apprentice, Dumitru Pop Tincu. There are currently about 800 tombs in this cemetery. After visiting it, you have all the chances to get a smile on your face.

Yeah, some of the messages on the crosses are really funny. Written in the first person, the naïve lyrics briefly describe the life and death of the one who rests under the cross, being well complemented by colored paintings. It is said that the idea of this cheerful attitude in the face of death came from the belief of the Dacians that life is, in fact, eternal. And death is nothing more than a simple transition to another world, which is not a tragic end but a moment of joy and a chance to meet the God Zamolxe.

A cross made by Dumitru Pop costs between 1500 and 2500 lei, depending on its complexity. The artist managed to create one in a maximum of two months. It should be noted that each cross is protected in the upper part by two metal gutters (against the weather) that form, through the joint, an arrow that locals prefer to say indicates the direction to the sky.

I’ve heard less positive opinions about Merry Cemetery, but my view is that this place is fascinating in its uniqueness and the artistic beauty of crosses. I found to reproduce a slightly sadistic “poetry” from the ones of the Săpânța cemetery crosses, which amused me a lot:

The Merry Cemetery from Săpânţa can be visited daily, between 10-18, the entrance fee is 4 lei.

1 Abandon yourself in the magnificent setting of Bârsana Monastery

After visiting it, on a wonderful day in August, I can say from the bottom of my heart that Bârsana Monastery is one of the most beautiful places in Romania. And probably the most beautiful church place in the country, although some will argue this statement. Bârsana is not a simple monastery (of nuns) but a monastic complex placed in a neat setting with the utmost attention.

Bârsana is located on the Iza Valley, 23 km from Sighetu Marmaţiei. Bârsana has an amazing stylistic and architectural unit that has the gift to patronize the entire settlement, offering a good mood and positivism that instantly overflows the visitor. The complex welcomes guests with a huge wooden gate, made in the Maramureşean style. Then it’s the bell tower, then you will face the superb complex that includes the 57 m high church (one of the tallest wooden buildings in Europe). The Abbey (superimposed construction), the Summer Altar and Holy Water place, Voivodal House, Artist’s House (which can accommodate writers and people with artistic preoccupations, who come here to create or rest), Casa Maicii, hermitages, studios, as well as the Icons Museum. All of them are wooden constructions, perfectly harmonized and loaded with tens of thousands of flowers of all colors, which give the place a cheerful and pleasant air.

The monastery’s history is quite complicated if we go far behind and think an Orthodox monastery was closed by the Austrians in 1791. The present monastic complex, dedicated to the 12 Apostles’ Council, was built after 1990 on an orchard with fruit trees and meadows. More precisely, in 1992, when patriarch Justinian decided to erect a new monastery, a year later sanctifying its foundation stone. In the following years, all buildings were erected one by one. 

After visiting everything, charging with energy, and freeing yourself from any negative thought, amuse yourself on the spectacle of the peacocks behind the wooden church. There would be a lot to add about this fantastic place, but it is best to see it with your own eyes and draw your own conclusions. We have one: if you arrive in Maramures, it’s a sin to go around Barsana.

One minute at Bârsana Monastery (video):

Bonus: Antigravity Hill

On the road between Cavnic and Ocna Şugatag, before Budești, there is a hill that, if you find it, will give you some moments of fun. Stop on the road at its base, stop the engine of the car, get it out of gear, and you’ll see the car going up the hill, defying any gravity law. The same thing happens to any round object that you place on the road — with a ball, for example.

The explanations are diverse, the most common being that, in fact, an optical illusion of landscape is created, that the road goes up, in reality, it goes down. Experimenting, we didn’t think it was about that. I’ve read a good article about this, and my opinion converges towards an antigravity phenomenon and not an optical illusion or a paranormal phenomenon. Anyway, the place also has a legend developed following an accident of a bus full of children, resulting in their tragic death. Since then, they say, children’s playful spirits have pushed any car to the hill.

See the Antigravitational Hill of Maramures:

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