Three More Days in Piatra Craiului

The week after our hiking road trip Bianca was off to Antwerp Tuesday-Saturday for a work conference so I rented another car and headed back to the Piatra Craiului mountains for three more days of hiking. The weather didn’t completely cooperate and rained a bit each day, but I was still able to get some great hiking in. I car camped in the foothills outside the town of Zărești and went hiking from there. The first day I went on a short day hike up Vf. Ascutit and the second two days I did an overnight hike along the main ridgeline.

Vf. Ascutit

The most direct trail up this peak is supposedly one of the hardest marked trails in Piatra Craiului, so I was very eager to see exactly what it had to offer. It’s only 4km from trailhead to peak but gains some ~1500m of elevation over that short distance. The estimated hiking time marked on the map & at the trailhead was 5.5-6.5 hrs up / 4-5 hrs down, but I was  skeptical of that since the trail was so short, and steep scrambling tends to be what I do well at. There were thunderstorms predicted to start around noon so I woke up a bit early (for me) at 6am and managed to get myself together enough to start hiking by 8.

The trail started quite gently across a big sheep meadow and then into the woods for a kilometer or so, before steepening a bit and heading up a dry river / wash bed strewn with lots of stone debris and bits of scree. I started out moving at near max hiking pace for me and felt good, breathing the fresh morning air and anticipating the nice workout ahead. After 30 minutes I arrived at a point where the main trail to the peak left the river bed and headed up some wooded slopes. Here there was a sign that said the peak was now only 4-5 hrs away – so far so good, 90 minutes of map time in 30 minutes of Matt time, maybe I won’t get caught in the rain after all. From there the trail went up and up through the forest at an ever increasing angle, in many parts involving hand over hand scrambling across large root systems holding the steep hillside together. Eventually I made it to a high shoulder of the peak, near but still below the treeline, where another refuge was located. From here the trail became a rocky scrambling traverse across the base of steep cliffs cut through in many places with jagged ravines. I was ready and anticipating the trail to head up one of these ravines and give me some real class four adventure based on the descriptions I had heard/read, but instead it just continued to traverse around the lower portion of these cliffs and eventually wind its way up their backside on lower angle slab / scree slope terrain. Eventually the trail wound around all the way and joined the Piatra Craiului ridgeline traverse trail where it was just a few more minutes to the peak and another refuge. My arrival time was 1020am, for a total ascent time of 2 hrs 20 minutes and the completion of an excellent morning workout.

Dark clouds were building in the sky low down and close to the ridgeline all around me so I only spent 10-15 minutes on the peak getting a quick snack before turning back around to try to make it down before the storms started. I got about 30 minutes down the trail to the base of the rocky cliff traverse when I felt the first rain drops on the my arms, and by the time I made it back to the refuge it had built up to a steady light rain. I decided to hang out in the refuge a bit to see what the weather had planned and was validated in that decision by the heavy downpour that followed. For about 45 minutes I sat in the refuge watching the weather and thinking about what to do. Eventually the sound of thunder in the distance convinced me that it was better to be a little bit wet than fried by lightning in a semi-exposed refuge so I decided to head down during a lighter period of rain. The rain had made the rocks and roots slippery and combined with the steepness of the trail I found the going to suddenly be extremely treacherous. This was reinforced several times by my landing backwards on my ass before it fully penetrated my skull that I needed to be a bit extra careful with my footing now.

The rain continued for another 20 or so minutes but as I hiked down and out away from the main ridgeline the weather let up a bit and eventually the sun came out as I was making my way through the final portion of woods trail. Just before breaking out into the meadow at the bottom I was met with a cacophony of barking and several dark, large, hairy and dirty shapes rushing me up the trail. It was a group of sheepdogs out with their shepherd guiding a huge flock of sheep up into the mountains for the day (or longer?). I stood by the side of the trail and watched the never-ending stream of sheep (and a few goats) go past, eventually wading my through them and down the trail. A few of the sheep gave me funny looks, but nothing more eventful than that. Back in the meadow and at my camp the sun was shining and I spread out my gear to dry while I snacked some more, then headed in to town for a bit to check the weather and plan my hike for the next couple days…

Piatra Craiului Ridgeline Overnight

My main intention for this trip was to try to do at least one, maybe two overnights on the main ridgeline trail of the Piatra Craiului mountains. The rain forecast for each day and the lack of water available on the ridge dissuaded me from attempting two nights out, but I was still determined to try for one. So on my second morning there I set off around 10am with a heavy pack containing 6 liters of water, food for two days, and overnight gear. My plan was to hike to the top of Vf. Padina Popii at the northern end of the ridgeline and then start heading south along the ridge with an eye on the weather to decide if I should bail or stick out the night. I was intending and hoping to spend the night in a refuge somewhere, but carried a bivouac bag just in case.

The trail I took up Vf. Padina Popii that morning was the same that Bianca and I had turned back from the previous week, only now it somehow seemed steeper with 2x the weight on my back. As I passed the Diana refuge and headed out of the woods into the scrambling section there were dark clouds building above, but no rain yet. The third class section that had stopped us before was no joke, with several moves over steep exposure that turned into fourth class if one eschewed use of the chains. After this came a long & nasty section of loose scree that, combined with the thunder now off in the distance, did nothing to encourage me about my plans for the day. As the first rain drops started to fall I decided that regardless of whatever else happened it would be safer to “retreat” to the ridgeline and nearby refuge above rather than turn back and descend the scree and third/fourth class scrambling in a heavy downpour. So I donned raincoat and pack cover and continued on up intent on learning just how big of a mistake I was making.

Luckily the scree ended before the rain began in earnest, which happened just as I was topping out on the summit of Vf. Padina Popii. From there it was only ~1km along the ridgeline south to Vf. Ascutit where I had been just yesterday and knew there was a (hopefully) waterproof shelter waiting for me. The ridge trail here was roughly level, with only a couple rises / dips of ~50-100 ft, but was uneven footing the entire way involving lots of careful footwork around protruding rocks and scrambling up & down larger sections of slab / boulders. Just loads of fun in the driving rain. After about 40 minutes of this I arrived at the Ascutit Refuge where I found three other hikers already sheltering. We were soon after joined by a group of three more hikers I had passed on the trail earlier, and the seven of us settled in a bit to wait out the storm. The pack cover & internal trash bag combo that I was using to keep my gear dry proved quite effective and I had plenty of warm dry clothing to change in to while we waited. I also decided that a hot meal sounded a lot better than the cold sandwich I had prepared for lunch and so I cooked up the instant noodles I had packed for dinner that night, which turned out to be an excellent idea because I had forgotten a lighter for my stove and needed to borrow one from one of the other hikers in the shelter.

The storm continued on for several hours with bursts of heavy downpours and even thirty minutes of hail which sounded quite ferocious inside the plastic refuge hut. There were several breaks in the storm that attempted to lure us back outside but were each followed by another heavy downpour. Eventually around 4pm that afternoon the storm around us ended, though there were still dark clouds on the horizon. The weather forecast we had been able to access within the refuge via cellphone predicted intermittent thunderstorms until 9pm that night, so it was unclear whether this was just another break or the true end of the storm. I decided to continue south along the ridge and try to make it to the next refuge before any more weather came in and then evaluate the situation again. From here it was 3-4 km of beautiful scrambling ridge trail to the next refuge. The trail was very fun and the cloud cover had lifted slightly to provide great views all around, though I couldn’t shake the feeling I was still racing the weather. By 6pm I had arrived, still dry, at the next refuge where I decided to stay for the night. At first I thought I was the only visitor there, but then a friendly mountain goat popped his head up from around the corner to see who was joining him for dinner. The clouds were continuing to lift and within an hour the sun had broken through and I had a beautiful evening relaxing and watching several other mountain goats roaming the surrounding peaks. Closer to sunset a very friendly Dutch couple arrived from the opposite direction I had come from and joined me for the night in the refuge.

The next morning I felt inspired by Uwe’s canyon sunrise pictures and got up early to climb the peak behind the refuge and watch the sunrise there. The goats were up early as well and I watched them jumping and running about the steep hillside as the sun crested over the horizon and I ate my crunchy cereal bar breakfast. Back at the refuge I packed up my gear for the day and discussed plans with the Dutch couple as they cooked breakfast. They were also on a planned two day backpack traverse of the ridgeline, but were running a bit low on food/water supplies and had only just reached the primary alpine portion of the hike, so decided to continue on just a short bit before descending towards one of the staffed mountain huts and a warm meal.

As I started off along the ridge trail I was quickly sweating heavily as the morning sun was shining strongly through the clear bluebird skies. The ridge was slowly decreasing in altitude but still involved much up and down scrambling, now with short sections of densely packed scrub pine mixed in for fun. After several kilometers of ridge and a couple hours I arrived at a junction where a descending trail took me down into the shadow of the ridge and looped back north in the direction I had come from that morning and the previous day. This trail was largely unremarkable when compared to the stunning ridge trail I had left above me, though it would surely hold its own in any other comparison. For the next few hours I hiked in and out of forest along the base of the cliffs rising up to the ridge above, at one point passing a large and impressive natural arch feature.

Early afternoon I arrived back to my car and camp where I spread my gear out to dry and started working on the beer I had waiting for me. The rest of the afternoon I spent lounging in the sun taking in the view of the mountains where I had just been, and that evening went down to the nearby mountain hut for a nice cooked meal. The next morning I woke up early and drove back to Cluj where I met Bianca coming home from her conference in Antwerp.

If you want even more pics you can view the rest on my google drive.

If you want even more pics you can view the rest on my google drive.

3 thoughts on “Three More Days in Piatra Craiului

  1. Three great trip reports. Makes me want to go hike over there. Those little plastic huts are pretty cool but I imagine can be pretty tight quarters at times. The last report dealing with the thunderstorms was pretty cool.

  2. The huts are actually more spacious than they first look. There was plenty of space in there for the three of us that night, even with the massive sleeping pad the Dutch couple had. It was nearly a foot thick and looked more like a car camping inflatable mattress than a backpacking pad to me. And the kicker was that it started leaking during the night and in the morning they said they barely slept because they kept sinking down into it.

    I think probably 4 normal sized people could sleep in these huts without any discomfort, but probably around 5 and above it would start getting a bit cramped, and smelly.

  3. Welcome to Europe, where the trail signs give times for the trails rather than distances. Doesn’t work for me at all. In the Alps I found that on a typical trail I usually use half the advertise time.

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