Our Plans Changed Again?!

Today we did a lot of sightseeing (i.e., driving) around Severin. I took a lot of pictures but of course, as I’m going through them right now at 12:40 am, I can barely remember what some of them are!

We started this morning with a drive up (or maybe down) the Danube River which separates Serbia and Romania where we are at. After some curves, we stopped to see this little gate that was apparently around during the Roman Empire. I know this picture isn’t very good, but it was way on the other side of the river.

Then, we ended up at this mini-Mount Rushmore-esque kind of rock face thing. I don’t remember what the story was behind it other than the fact that it was worked on between 1994 and 2004 and it is not complete. They stopped building in 2004 when the main designer died and they are just now starting back up but it’s supposed to cost like over a million dollars so it’s not going very fast.

While we were taking pictures of the stone face, Jerry and Rica were working out a price for us to get on the boats nearby and go on a tour up the river. We ended up spending the next hour or so going up the river between Romania and Serbia and we even stopped off at one of the caves we passed to explore inside (for 4 Lei; $1.00 = about 3.5 Lei). In these pics below, Serbia is on the left, Romania is on the right.

We did not get done until around 1:30/2:00 and we all thought we were going out to eat at a restaurant in Severin. However, when we ended up back at the house later, we realized this was not the case and instead, they had ordered pizza for lunch (yep, that's a veggie pizza with corn on it).

After lunch, we had a bit of free time. Most of us took a quick bus ride into Severin to exchange some more money and do some shopping. The first time we exchanged money, they wouldn’t take like half of our American dollars because they only would accept crisp bills with no markings, creases, or tears. This time though (at a different place), they took all our money (it was weird but whatever). Shopping wasn’t that great because there really weren’t that many souvenirs that people were looking for and the clothes stores really felt kind of like a garage sale, with a random mix of clothes from this decade and many others. We got back to the house between 6:00 and 6:30 and we were all like, “are we supposed to be eating again even though we just ate?!”We tried figuring out the plan for the night since we all wanted to do so many things but it took us forever to figure it out and then everything kept changing. Some of the group wanted to go play volleyball at the orphanage. Others were getting their eyebrows threaded by a woman they met in a church service who is really well known for that in the area. And another group wanted to stop back by Carrefour. We had a plan and then it changed and then we had a new plan but that changed too. This went on for a while until I gave up and just sat around waiting for someone to leave or something to happen (I wanted to run in and run out of Carrefour and then go to the orphanage). Eventually, I left with a small group and quickly browsed Carrefour for some snacks, toilet paper, and water. The rest of the group left before me since they were headed back to the house and I went the other way to the orphanage. A volleyball game was already in progress (the volleyball group had come by earlier) and since it has become apparent on this trip that I really suck at volleyball, I decided not to join in! Instead, I played with the kids for the rest of the night until our group had to head out back to the hotel. Then, we came inside, ate some cookies (yep, at like 10:00 pm) and then played a bit of paper football around the house (they love the little paper footballs that I made them). I helped the girls with their baths tonight since they were all gross from being outside and it was pretty funny. The light was out in their bathroom so I had my phone in there with my flashlight app on and they really liked that. Surprisingly, after the baths, it wasn’t hard to get the kids tucked into bed. I went and talked to them (or tried) for a few minutes and then said goodnight and spent a little more time talking to Felicia downstairs. Around like 11:15 pm, I finally came up to pack for tomorrow and shower.

In the morning, we’re leaving no later than 8:00 am (ideally; all depending on when the group manages to finish breakfast and check out of the hotel) and heading out to some of the castles. I think it is about a 4 hour drive, not including our lunch break and any others we might need. (ah hah! Just killed a mosquito on my hand finally as I typed this!) If we have time tomorrow, we’ll do a little shopping in Bran or try to get in on the last tour of Dracula’s castle. If not, we’ll hit that up Wednesday morning and then see Peles in the afternoon. Wednesday night, we’ll head out and stay in Bucharest since the group is flying out super early on Thursday morning while Cathy, Chad, and I will all be on the 8:45 am (maybe; we don’t know what time the train is yet) train from Bucharest to Severin. There prob. won’t be many more pictures to come of the castles since 1) I’ve already been and already have pictures and 2) these are the castles you have to pay an exorbitant price for if you want to bring cameras in.

Hopefully, after this trip, I’ll have an update on what the plan is for the next 2 weeks. We’ll prob. jot down some ideas for what to do with the kids and what else to see in the area so maybe I’ll be able to post that when I get back. I’m assuming we’ll have internet at the hotels in Bran and Bucharest but just in case, if you don’t hear from me for the next few days, no worries… we’re just on the road!

Here are the pictures from Severin!

On a side note, I dropped my camera on the bus and now all of my pictures are transferring upside down to my computer….. Not a good sign.