What do you do when you feel the need for fresh air, exercise, and adventure? You put on your backpack and go discover a new place.
Nearby the Vidraru Dam, in the Fagaras Mountains is Stan Valley (Valea lui Stan).
Trail
Stan Valley – Poiana Calugarita – Vidraru Dam
Mark: Red dot in a white circle
The starting point of the trail is 2 km before Vidrarul Dam, if you come from Curtea de Arges, just beside an “Attention, the area frequented by bears” sign.
The route has the shape of a circle/oval, and basically, you walk around a slope, a hill or how you want to call it.
Duration
According to the indicator, the route can be done in 4 ½ hours. And we can confirm. We’ve managed to finish it in the four-hour half including pauses, pictures and walking through the rain.
Our experience – Stan Valley
We can say it was the perfect trail for one day escape.
At 7:30 AM, we left Bucharest and after a two-and-a-half-hour journey, we reached Vidraru Dam. We left our car in the parking lot next to the dam, put our backpacks on and went to the starting point of the trail, which is 2 km back.
We preferred to leave the car near the dam because at the starting point of the trail there is no parking. And we didn’t want to leave the car along the road in the ditch.
Start
The route starts near a crucifix and a sign with “Warning, area frequented by bears”, where you find the marking the trait, which tells you the trail you will follow.
Half an hour later of walking near the river, the fun begins … Vertical, horizontal, oblique stairs, chains and jumping from stone to stone to cross the river without getting wet. Passing by beautiful landscapes with tall rock walls, trees, canyons, and amazing waterfalls.
After dozens of photos and moments full of adrenaline, the trail left the river behind and took us up through the woods to Poiana Calugarita. Just when we arrived at the clearing the clouds decided to unleash a beautiful rain. And we made the decision to finish the route despite the rain. It was a good decision because it didn’t stop until 2-3 hours later.
Once past Poiana Calugarita begins the descending through the forest on a well-defined path, then on a forest road that passes by the former Calugarita Cabin, and then on the road the surrounds the Lake Vidraru back to The Vidraru Dam.
It rained so much that we felt sorry that we didn’t have shampoo with us because we felt like we went in the shower dressed. But the good part is that we were preventive and we had dry clothes in the car.
The rain transformed our experience in a true adventure.
