Great photographers wake up when others sleep, remain on location when others go home, go out when others stay in. So on January 1st, i just HAD to be out taking photos. This post shows that just going out when others stay in does not make you a great photographer 
. On the bright side, I do have some very awkward photos to show :
Sunday September 27th, Capatanii Mountains, 12 cars. Goal: try to cross over the Balota peak, find nice tracks, take pictures of the beautiful scenery. This is just a preview / teaser
Be sure to check back the following days for more pictures of this truly beautiful area. Easier yet, use the RSS feed or just ask feedburner to deliver you new posts by email…
Sunday March the 22nd, 8 members of the Club4x4 forum were joined by one newcomer with a stock Mitsubishi Pajero in a trip to Calugareni, for a few hours of offroad fun. Images speak volumes, so here they are:
If, by any chance you would like to read a (Romanian language) recounting, this is the forum post on the dedicated thread.
As always, If you like these pictures and would want to see more, you are invited to subscribe to my blog.
PS: special thanks to Daniel, my replacement photographer for the day. Most of the photos are captured by him with my camera.
Sunday, March 1st, beautiful sunny day in Bucharest.
What could one do but go out to Balotesti, meet some other 4×4 enthusiasts and:
(there are 2 categories of pictures – “forum” – 800 px wide and “web” – 1200 px wide)
If offroad is your thing, stay tuned for more (RSS or EMAIL) because you can bet there will be more to come!
After a work meeting in the Paraul Rece area the weather was incredibly good so I could not miss the local offroad opportunities.
Starting on DN73A (from Predeal to Rasnov), at the bottom of the descent there is a small road to the right, going “up” to “the priests”. I firs took that road, which was taken care of, almost completely cleaned of snow.
However, I suggest wearing chains if you go on snow, because I did get stuck with the Simex tyres after one 180 degrees turn – the tires were polishing the icy snow and the car was stuck. I had a winch so I was able to move the car to get some snow under the wheels.
Here’s the track, the sinuos road to the left is DN73A (Predeal – Rasnov), after descending from Paraul Rece
Track to "la calugari"
It was fun for a warm up, and also a great opportunity to take some (nice?) photos:
Panorama shot from "La Calugari"
Winter Tree
Car Winter Portrait
Very quick we went back because the action until now was NOT (!) enough 
For convenience we took the same road, did not bother to explore the possibility to go directly downhill:
Return from "La Calugari"
Return from "La Calugari"
Back on the DN73A road we turned right, and headed to Rasnov, where we were instructed to take “Drumul Glajeriei” up to it’s end, and then on a forest road to Tohanul Nou. I am having a rough time trying to draw this on the map (I can not find enough points and I did not have GPS with me), so I will only be able to show you the beautiful sites I encountered:
Unidentified Forest Road
WCR - tracks
Emerging Victorious
And just look at the glorious finish of the forest road:
Winterscape in HD
If you like these pictures, stay tuned for more (RSS or EMAIL).
I am not a big fan of winter, mainly because it’s cold. I am prepared technologically (clothes, shoes, tires, 4×4, ropes, cables, etc), but I find myself harboring a constant desire for the summer to come. However, since I am not a bear, I cannot hibernate. This means that I still have to work.
Last weekend, work took me to the mountains in the Prahova Valley Region (Also called “Philadelphia” because of the “PH” in the registration plates). In the past few years, I have done my best to avoid this area of Romania, because it’s the most known and visited area in term of mountain resorts. This means expensive, overrated, crowded and with bad services. Not to mention the fact that one needs to drive on the deadliest road in Romania in order to reach the area. It’s so deadly because of the high number of cars traveling each day, which means a high number of “buffaloes”.
That being said, there are enough things to see in the area that you should visit at least once. But, enough with the chit-chat, here are some photos from this weekend:
Lonely Tree - winter version
Carpathians
And this is what “far far away looks like to me”. Not a “kingdom” but everyman is king in his own house 
Far, far away
If you like these photos, subscribe via email or be cool and use the RSS feed and tell all your friends, because there are more photos coming from this trip…
Defender in the snow
Sunday December 7th was the last of three days of the Ursus Free Track urban offroad event organized at the Palatul Pionierilor in the Tineretului Park.
Today was the ‘extreme’ day. If you ask me, the organizer’s decision to reverse the start and finish points of the track has made the day arguably easier than the ‘open’ day. Drivers would now go through the big hole in one step down two steps up as opposed to two steps down, own step up like in the previous day. However, the drizzle that kept coming back has made the track more difficult.
According to Mark Hankock’s advice, I first took the ‘safe shots’ for this day, descriptive of the action:
Greu la deal
For a reason beyond me, this Polaris was the crowd's favorite
The way of the Samurai
Sideways Rubicon
Blue Vitara
Iiii Haaaa
Copilots were essential today too:
Advice on the Fly
Copilot work
Copilot work
Copilot work
Having assured the safe shots, I decided to go for different things today, to give y’all a more complete idea about the event:
Tzuparu says you're out
Pure Brilliance
Hilbilly Express
But let’s get back to the real stars of these last 2 days, and come meet the close up:
18k of engineering
If any of you wanted a more detailed look at these monsters, here’s the inside scoop:
Command post
3 brakes
The 4 pedals are as follows: 1 gas, 1 general brake, 1 brake for the left side, 1 brake for the right side. The car has automatic transmission
And I would like to finish this post with two shots that I think capture the essence of offroading:
Red car, dramatic sky
4x4 essence
If you liked my photos, here are the ones from Day 2. I also feel this is a good time to point out the ways that you can easily keep up with my great work:
- email subscriptions
- the RSS feed
Use them at will!
Between December 5th and 7 th, URSUS the beer maker is sponsoring the first “urban offroad” competition. December 5th (Friday) was reserved for the ‘Hobby’ category, December 6th for the ‘Open’ category and Sunday December 7th is when the ‘Extreme’ category will be held. This is my (photo)report of the day.
The “Open” day meant that the track was pretty difficult and cars had to meet minimal requirements like having a winch, at least MT tires, etc. Judging by the going of events, a short wheel base was also vey useful, and the winch and MT tires were sine qua non.
To my shame I did not arrive in time to catch the start of the event, because, being Saturday, I slept until 11:40. But I was lucky enough to reach there just in time to see the perfect example that money is not all: billionaire offspring Costel Casuneanu was going at it when I arrived and he lent his name to a corner, because he did not manage to finish that corner on 4 wheels:
First "Attempt" - Nice going man!
Second Pass - a Save this time
One more thing is that the second pass was still in the first round. Yes, “WHAAATTT??” is the correct reaction to what I described happened
Nobody else had any problems with the same corner. Furthermore, Casuneanu Jr managed to completely kill the car in the second attempt. Case closed.
Here are some ‘standard’ shots of other drivers and their passings:
Land Cruiser
Samurai
Just Cruising
These guys went very smoothly in their first run, they made it seem easy, no events, no nausea, just went through it all very well
Mitsu Pajero - Round 1
but then did not manage to complete the second attempt – they got stuck at the early beginning. Too bad:
Mitsu Busted
The firs upped it’s trickiness in between rounds – several drivers had some problems in their second pass:
Stuck at the first ramp
Part of the race, part of the track
As you can see, this Vitara’s driver wanted to have some memories from this track, so they snatched a part of the first ramp. The most sought after picture of the first round must be this one (my account on club4x4.ro is not yet validated, so I was not able to post it where they asked for it 
) :
See, Ninja, It's not like in the movies
Just a few days before the event, there were voices on the club4x4.ro forum asking ‘why is it compulsory to have a hard top? why can’t we participate with a soft top?’ Well, the organizers must have foreseen this :
Why you need hardtop
Just imagine these two shots if the car was a soft top. And keep in mind that the driver was the only one without a helmet !! There were also guys who sat this one out:
Not this time
but this is not about them. The second pass was much more difficult, especially because of the big hole, that was carved even more in the first pass, and became very hard to master in the second, causing a number of abandons:
Dive in
Unfortunately we need to tow you out
Another Victim
Mind you, the last two cars are being towed out in reverse! There were some that did make it out, some very easily (a red Wrangler came out incredibly smooth while everybody else were sweating it) and some with hard work, talent and copilot work:
Mitsu Rises
Land Cruiser emerging
G-Kklasse emerging
Copilot work
Hard Work
The situation became even more dramatic as the light disappeared and evening snuck in:
Land Cruiser by night
In the end of this post, I feel the need to also show the sponsor, because the everything was incredibly well organized (ON THE OFFROAD PART):
Sponsor - Alcohol free beer
Well, actually we should close this with another shot of offroad action: the tires
Storming through the tires
On December 7th the ‘Extreme’ category follows, and I will be there for more photos. Check back! (Or use the email or RSS to be automatically informed)
Just 5 kilometers outside Campulung one finds the village of Namaesti, home to the George Toparceanu memorial house and to a second corner of the equilateral(?) triangle of rupestrian churches in Arges county.
This is a nuns monastery with a very nice compound, with flowers on every parcel of free space. On the flip side, because of it’s placement on a very steep hill with narrow alleys and a thick forest, photo locations are rare. The place is beautiful nonetheless, and I was lucky to get there on a warm, sunny autumn day:
Namaesti Monastery - Full Splendour
I think this angle best illustrates the charm of this place.
Of course I could not resist going on the top to get ‘another angle’:
View from the top
An interesting thing about the way this church is built is that the cross on the top of the tower is not facing the main entrance:
Namaesti Front View - Rotated Cross
BUT WAIT !! There is more! Inside the church there is a ‘miracle working icon’ which people come to visit from all over the country:
Miracle Working Icon
This page has some more historical info in English and these two are in Romanian ( 1 & 2 ). If you would like to go there, here’s a map to show you where it’s placed:
Namaesti on the Map
If anybody wonders about why use Microsoft, it’s easy. Google doesn’t have the slightest clue about Romania.
Ok, here’s just one more photo before we close up:
Pretty Unique Church Tower
If you liked this post, be sure to visit the Stone Ravens Monastery too and to check back for pictures from Cetatuia, the last corner of the triangle. If you do not want to check my blog every day, just click here to get updates automatically delivered to you via email or get this RSS feed‘s adress into your aggregator.
