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We arrived in Bucharest on a Saturday in late June, 2003. When riding into the city we were very happy to notice that there was not a lot of smog in the air. We mistakenly thought that there would not be too much traffic because of this. We found ourselves quite literally chocking on the dust that was in the air as we entered the fray. At one point on our ride through the city to locate our hotel we encountered a truck spraying water on the streets in an attempt to reduce the dust level.
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As we rode through the city we could not help but notice that the infrastructure is in dire need of repair. The tracks for the trams in Bucharest are the same as those we had seen in every other city in Romania that we had traveled through - they were so old and run down that the trams could not go faster than 20 KPH and in many cases were limited to 5 KPH. While many of the streets have been resurfaced, too many continue to be in need of repair. We found many that caused the speed of the traffic to be reduced to less than 5 KPH as the trucks, busses, cars and our bikes crawled through, over and around pot holes that in some cases were more than a foot deep and three feet (one meter) in diameter.
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Our tour book also warned us about the serious stray dog problem the city has. We noticed several dogs wandering about as we rode through the city. We stopped at a gasoline station to ask for directions and in the vacant field adjacent there was a pack of about 5 dogs that launched a snarling attack on a dog that someone had on a leash walking along the sidewalk. We were actually happy to see this because their initial target was us as we were pulling back into the street having completed our business - we were very happy that their attention was diverted to something other than us. But, other than that, we did not encounter many dogs out and about on their own.
We stayed in a hotel near the Gara de Nord (the main train station) which is about two kilometers north west of the central part of the city. There is a market in the train station that we found to be well stocked, except for fruit, and met our needs while we were in town. We were pleasantly surprised to find a small empty refrigerator in our room. We chose to provide our own breakfast because we felt the €9.00 our hotel was charging for breakfast was too much. We chose our hotel because it was new and provided secure parking - there were two security people in the parking lot 24 hours a day.
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Located on the plain between the Carpathian Mountains and the Danube River Bucharest was founded in 1459. The city is the largest in Romania and has been the capital since 1862. The city has numerous old buildings with varied architecture, such as the Stavropoleos Church built in 1724 (left). It was built by a Greek monk in a typical Brancoveanu style. They were holding a service as we walked by and the outer courtyard was full of people, as well as the small interior. There are a multitude of these small churches of varying styles all throughout the city.
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One of the architectural gems is the Romanian Athenaeum, the city’s main concert hall which dates from 1888 (right). The tour book indicates that the interior is magnificent, but since it was undergoing restoration we were unable to view it. We hope that the restoration includes improving the small park in front of the hall that has tremendous potential and would provide the perfect setting for this grand structure.
The city has numerous squares and tree lined boulevards which are its focal points. While this contributes to the city’s charm whatever beauty this produces is marred, unfortunately, by the dusty earth that the heavy traffic kicks up as cars, trucks and buses all compete for their position in the competition for space on the heavily trafficked streets.
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We spent a bit of time last on a Sunday afternoon exploring Herastrau Park which is located in the north central part of the city. It is a lovely area but like all of Bucharest suffers from years of neglected maintenance. It looks like some investment has been made by a soft drink manufacturer that the local youth were taking advantage of. We were surprised at the number of girls that were participating. While there were one or two skate boards, the majority were on roller blades.
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The park covers several acres and is the greenest spot in the city. On a Sunday afternoon, this was the place to be. Families were out walking about, enjoying the cool green shade provided by the mature tall trees (right). There is a large lake in the park and the Village Museum, a collection of nearly 300 churches, wooden houses and farm buildings, first assembled in 1936 in a mixture of styles from the various communities of Romania. It is a nice overview of the different lifestyles across the country and many craftsmen are there selling their wares, from embroidered shirts to intricately carved spoons and painted eggs.
Near the park is the Triumphal Arch (below), built in 1936 to commemorate the reunification of Romania in 1918. As you can see from the photo, it strongly resembles the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and it is in fact modeled on that arc. Like Paris, it is in the middle of a large roundabout, but there wasn’t nearly the amount of traffic as it was Sunday when we took this picture The following day, Monday, we rode past the Arc on our way out of town and the traffic was a bit heavier.
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Our overall impression of Bucharest is that it could easily be held up as a shining example as to why the people of the world have rejected communism. Other than the massive redevelopment of the area around Piata Unirii during the last years of Ceausecus’ reign the city has spent the 50 years between 1940 and 1989 deteriorating. It is a sad thing to say but what could be a beautiful town was allowed to disintegrate into a place where there are too many crumbling unoccupied buildings to count. We found it very depressing to see this and imagine that life here must have been very difficult during the communist era. It is going to take a long time and a lot of investment before the city is restored to what it could be - a beautiful metropolis with tree lined streets, numerous parks and good public transportation.
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The picture at right was taken at the Palace of Parliament, Ceausescu’s House of the People, looking up Boulevard Unirii towards Piata Unirii. For those who do not know, Ceausescu was the last dictator to rule Romania during the communist era. The entire Mall is lined with trees and both sides of the street have buildings of a unified architecture, with retail space at street level and apartments or office space above. While the apartments appeared lived in, the great majority of the retail spaces were vacant.
The fountain shows how things have been left to deteriorate - many of the jets that should be spouting water skyward from the center of the pool do not function and none of the small ones around the edge of the pool that should be spouting water towards the center of the pool work. And the landscaping is nothing but weeds. Sad, really.
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At left is the Palace of Parliament which was described in our tour book as, “...an incredible Stalinist structure that was still unfinished when Ceausescu was overthrown in 1989. Three shifts of 20,000 workers and 700 architects toiled for more than five years on this massive palace, using almost exclusively Romanian materials. At 330,000 square meters (1,082,677 square feet) it is the second-largest building in the world after the US Pentagon. Numerous historic structures were demolished to accommodate it.” This building sits at the end of the Mall pictured above. We believe the entire conglomeration was intended to be the showcase for Ceausescu, but it appears his dream never quite materialized. And now it will be interesting to see what the people of Bucharest will make of their heritage.
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