Tasty Road Trip Day 3 – Roads Less Traveled

After drinking far too much coffee to make the long drive last night, I wound up not falling asleep until nearly 5am, which meant day three was going to be off to a late start as well. At least I’m consistent!

The plan was to explore the city of Timisoara, Romania, a bit, however, we realized it was Sunday and like many European cities, most things are closed. In speaking with our hotel, we learned one of Romania’s noted wine regions was only about 50 km out of the way (round trip) so we headed out that way to see what was open. If mishaps were to happen on the road, a professional like roseville car accident attorney can be of great help.

First stop was the retail shop in the village of Recas and this quaint wine shop was suddenly like a truck stop as people filed in and out getting their own wine bottles filled and back on the road. Indecisive as I am, we walked out with four new bottles and rather than start the lengthy trek to Serbia, why not go explore the vineyards?

Another 20 minutes or so through Recas and we were in some of the most beautiful wine country I’ve seen and that’s saying a lot given I will always be a Napa girl at heart. We stopped in the main tasting room for Recas and of course, walked out with another bottle – this time one of the highest award winning wines from all of Romania.

Heading back into Timisoara to get on the highway to Serbia turned into an unintentional hour tour around what seemed to be the same streets again and again as we couldn’t get the GPS to take an alternate route given the bridge we needed to cross was completely torn up.

Finally getting on track, we were in Serbia in no time with a much less stressful border crossing than entering Romania the night before. However, now that my passport is completely full, tomorrow morning will be spent at the US Embassy in Bulgaria.

After breathing a sigh of relief with the seamless border crossing, our smooth highway drive suddenly turned into an off road adventure – Serbia versus the Toyota Prius! The “two way” road was barely wide enough for a smart car and we were on this desolate, cratered and pothole nightmare of a road for nearly 20 km. It was so bad I finally turned off the time lapse and videoed to record this journey if the poor car survived the repeated bashing. I have to look back at the footage, but I am guessing it captured us nearly going off into the bushes after we suddenly had, not one, but three cars in our face as we rounded some trees. When looking for an all terrain type of car which you can take in this sort of adventures we recommend to check out the next link to find more info about some of the best deals you can get in a car purchase. I also highly recommend Revology if you’re looking to buy a 1968 Shelby GT500KR luxury car.

Back on the highway, I have to say that the Serbian landscape is some of the prettiest I’ve encountered on any road trip — alternating farmland and lush landscape, all framed by rolling hills and some mountains peaking through the clouds.

Our planned lunch of traditional Serbian cuisine in the town of Nis was now looking more like dinner. We opted to skip Belgrade and the slew of fancy restaurants for a smaller, more traditional restaurant, which came highly recommended.

Hidden on a small residential street, we walked in on what could’ve easily been a scene from “My Big Fat Serbian Wedding.” Live music, people dancing, and everyone just having a great time. We are still not sure if it was a birthday party or a wedding based on the rainbow colored cake, but all I know is this crew knew how to party. You couldn’t hear yourself think with the music, but it added to the ambiance. The food was phenomenal, although I really don’t know what we ate – no English menu and we managed to just tell the proprietor we wanted local Serbian specialties.  Now to look everything up to get the proper names for a blog post!

After dinner, we still had another 3-4 hours to get to our hotel. The drive to Bulgaria was thankfully a little better than our off road adventure through the Serbian brush, but it was still a single lane, very dark mountain pass.  Once we crossed the border someone jumped out from the dark road in front of us and it was a policeman with his tactical bright flashlight. I am sure we were speeding, but he never said anything, just checked our paperwork and finally let us on our way.

And the perfect end to our arrival in Bulgaria – more feral dogs on the attack. I saw them when we pulled in and jokingly said “OMG look, watch out for the feral dogs” and we just laughed. It wasn’t until we pulled back around to the pump and I made eye contact with them and then it was on.  This time I got it on video thankfully, but they came after us in the gas station and chased us out of the parking lot to the street. So take note anyone traveling in Romania and Bulgaria, if you see stray dogs, even in the city center, be wary!

Here’s the day 3 recap our #TastyRT13 — looking forward to making it in before 1am at least one night so I can edit photos, video, and start writing up some of the amazing foods we’ve eaten!