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Everything Rimetea Trails Visit

On the top of the Sleeping Gigant

The Sekler’s Stone is one of the most visited mountains in Romania in the last years, due to its spectacular views and the abundance of sightseeing, but also because of touristical marketing. The unique shape of Sekler’s Stone attracts visitors from all over the world, as it offers nature, culture, history, legends, adventure, trails, relaxation and most of all, quietness.

The mountain is part of Trascau Mountains and it reaches heights of 1129 m. It has two parts: Coltii Trascaului (known also as the Small Rock) on the northern side, with a 1113 m peak, and Piatra Secuiului (Sekler’s Stone also known as the Big Rock) on the southern part, with a maximum height of 1129 m.

Seen from the villages of Coltesti and Rimetea, the mountain range seems to be a petrified sleeping gigant, with its head pointing south. This interesting shape inspired villagers to tell stories and create legends about gigants, princesses, knights and even about natural changes in surrounding landscapes.
Climb the Sleeping Gigant
The imposing rocky mountain can be climbed almost by anyone. Even if it has a difference of level of about 600 m from Trascau Valley, the route from Rimetea to the top of the rock is not very difficult. However, proper equipment is required among with a good physical condition and the respect for the mountain.

To reach the top of the mountain, you have more than just one route. Depending on how much time you have for enjoing the area, take a look on the board in front of the town hall to choose your trail. The most followed route by tourists eager to see Rimetea from above, is the blue cross trail which leads you from the main square in Rimetea through the gap between Coltii Trascaului and Piatra Secuiului. On this trail, in one and a half hour you are on the top of the sleeping gigant, looking down to Trascau Valey.
If you have one day to visit the surroundings and you like walking around, we encourage you to follow the route Rimetea-Coltii Trascaului-Piatra Secuiului-Coltesti-Ardascheia-Rimetea. You will enjoy the view of the mountain from different angles, in different lights of the day. You will find yourself as well at the bottom and the top of the sleeping gigant. You will meet the contemporary turmoil of turists and the former silence of the nature.
Follow the trail
Rimetea – Coltii Trascaului (1113 m) – Piatra Secuiului (1129 m) – Coltesti – Ardascheia – Rimetea
Trail mark: red stripe + blue cross
Difficulty: easy/moderate
Time: 4-6.5 hours
Distance: 18 km
Ascending: 969 m
Descending: 966 m
Starting Point: northern entrance in the village of Rimetea (Marin Preda street)
Ending Point: main square in Rimetea
The starting point for this trail is the northern entrance in the village of Rimetea. From here you will have to follow the dirt road which bypasses the forest through the left side. You will see the red stripe trail mark as you approach the forest. The trail in the forest is steep, but in some places, stairs were built. As you get closer to Coltii Trascaului, you can leave the trail few meters to the right for some panoramic landscape photos. Getting back to the red stripe mark trail, follow the route to Piatra Secuiului, where you encounter the blue cross mark. From this point, you will have to follow this blue cross until Coltesti village.

In Coltesti, take left on the main road and shortly turn right on the road near the church and local store. Follow the road towards the ruins of Trascau Fortress, but keep an eye on the blue cross. The fortress will be on the left side. The blue cross takes you, on the dirt road, to the base of Ardascheia peak where you meet the red stripe trail mark. Here you need to leave the blue cross and turn right on the red stripe. From here, the red stripe takes you by Rimetea Spring and back to the village of Rimetea.
View over Rimetea
On the top of Sekler’s Stone
Coltii Trascaului
Trascau Valley
Poppies at the base of Sekler’s Stone

Limestone rocks of Sekler’s Stone


Toponymy
Piatra Secuiului or Piatra Mare (romanian), Szekelykő (hungarian), Szekler’s Stone (english)
Colții Trascăului or Piatra Mică (romanian), Várszikla (hungarian), Little Stone (english)
Rîmetea (romanian), Torocko (hungarian), Eisenburg (german)
Colțești (romanian), Torockoszentgyörgy (hungarian), Sankt Georgen (german)
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Everything Food

Langosh

The old times villagers’ breakfast, on bread baking day
The hungarian food speciality, the todays deep fried dough, was traditionally baked in the front of the clay or brick oven, close to the flames. This flat bread was served as breakfast on the days when new bread was baked for the family.

Due to it’s baking method, close to the flames, this food was named lángos, the hungarian word “láng” meaning “flame”.

The ingredients for the langos dough are flower, yeast, salt and water or milk. All these are worked together either by hand or by a kneading machine, then the dough is left leavened. This process creates the air bubbles in the langos.

Nowadays Lángos is prepaired by deep frying in fat or oil and is served fresh and warm, usualy with topping (honey, jam, grated cheese, sour cream, garlic sauce, sometimes even ham or sausages).

Langos is popular all year long and all over the Eastern European countries, known by different names such as: langoš (Czeck Republik, Slovakia, Croatia), languš or mekike (Serbia), langaš (Slovenia), mekitsi (Bulgaria), langosz (Poland) and langoș (Romania).

In Rimetea, you can taste the local lángos with different toppings, at the camper van near the local store, across the town hall. Enjoy!
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Everything Food

Local cooking spice flavours

Love for herbs, spices and vegetables
The smell and taste of any food is mostly given by the spices you put in. Local villagers love to grow their own herbs, spices and vegetables they frequenty use for cooking delicious meals.

If you visit a garden in Coltesti, Rimetea or any other village from Trascau Valley, for sure you will find some onions, garlic, thyme, dill, horseradish, tarragon, carraway seeds, parsley, red pepper or paprika. The spices are not complete without bay leaves and cinnamon, although these two are mediterranean spices and they don’t grow in this region.
Onion

One of the most used vegetable in local hungarian villages is the onion. Bálint Tibor wrote in ”Erdélyi lakomában” (Transylvanian settlements), that if you remove the onion from the food consumption phyramid, the whole construction will fall. Most of the local cooking recipes start with chopping an onion into small pieces and frying it into hot fat or oil.

The villages among the Aries River are well known for their good production of onions, so if the onion production fails in the gardens of Trascau Valley due to unfortunate weather conditions, and it is not enough for the entire year, villagers can always buy onions in the neighbouring area.
Garlic

Is the main ingredient for home made pork sausages. It is always grown in own gardens and if sometimes self production isn’t enough, villagers buy it on the market in Aiud or Turda.
Thyme

Is is always used to spice up the pickled cabbage, blood sausages, innards sausages, pumpkin ragout, cabbage soup (lucskoskáposzta).
Dill

This is the Thyme twin spice. Usualy they are used together in different cabbage based foods. The green dill leaves, are often used in curd soup, dillsauce or curd pancakes. Dried dill leaves are used to pickels and lucskos cabbage. A good housewife always dry a quantity of thyme and dill form it’s own garden, so the supply will be enough for the entire cold season cooking.
Horseradish

It is loved for the chilly flavour and is commonly used as natural preservative for cabbage and cucumber pickels (keeps vegetables krispy). Sometimes horseradish is shredded and kept in vinegar for longer periods.
Tarragon

It’s leaves are usualy kept in vinegar and it is used for making the soups souerer (beans soup, tarragon souer soup). The plant grows healthier if, in spring, ashes are spread on the ground where it is planted. In Rimetea, it is said that only the one who planted the tarragon is allowed to take it’s leaves, otherwise the plant will die next year as it doesn’t like to be touched by strangers’ hands.
Parsley

It is used both for the leaves and the root, for vegetable and chicken soups. Villagers often use the green leaves for boiled potatoes aseasoning.
Red pepper

Is the most well known vegetable in hungarian dishes. Dried and grounded, can be found as hot or sweet paprika. In Coltesti and Rimetea’s cooking receipes, the sweet paprika is used more often. Besides it’s good taste, it gives the dish an appetizing aspect. The paprika supply in Trascaului Valley villages comes from the homemade production in the settlements among Mures River. Once or twice a year, the ordered amount of paprika is brought to the housewifes.
Pepper

There is not a house without this spice. It is used almost in every dish. In the past, villagers used to search in the stores for the small paperbags with pepper and buy larger quantities so they would be well prepaired for the time of saussage making in winter. Nowadays, pepper can be found in every little store, also in the villages, so there are no worries anymore.
Caraway seeds

Even though it can be grown in own gardens, local villagers prefer to pick up the wild carraway that can be found on the lands near Trascau Fortress. The wild plant has a stronger flavour and it is usually collected in August, while the seeds are still green. It is than tied up in a big bounch and hanged in the shadow. When dried out, the seeds are taken and stored for later use.

The caraway seeds are often used to make caraway soup, salty homemade sticks and crackers, but also tea for children’s stomachache. The seeds are sometimes used to make a type of pálinka, which is drank mostly by women, for it’s sweet flavoured taste.
Bay leaves

Mediterranian spice, it is used in hungarian cooking as dried leaves for potato soups, sauces, stews.
Cinnamon

The traditional Somodi sponge cake can’t be baked without this spice. Even in old times, the villagers could somehow manage to buy cinnamon. It was used only for holiday cakes, and everyone enjoied both the smell and the taste of cinnamon.
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People

Haystacks

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People

Shepherd’s Life

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Everything Fauna and Flora

Flowers

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Everything Fauna and Flora Trails

Silos Natural Reservation Park

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Fauna and Flora

Green lizard

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Everything Fauna and Flora

Butterflies

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Everything Food

Pálinka

Home made spirit drink
Your trip to Rimetea and Coltesti is not complete if you don’t try at least a glass of home made drink.

Altough “pálinka” has it’s origins in Hungary and it is protected as a geographical indication of the European Union, this spirit drink was and is still largely produced in most of the slavic countries. The name itself, “pálinka”, derives from the slavonic stem “paliti”, which means “to burn, to distill”.

The pálinka from Coltesti and Rimetea follows the same ritual as any distilled home made drink follows. What makes it different from other spirits is it’s flavour. Made out of good quality fruits, usually plums, apples, pears and sometimes apricots, quince and (sour)cherries, which are localy grown, the pálinka from Trascau Valley can be proudly presented as a no sugar addition spirit drink.

A popular hungarian saying says: “what can be used to prepare jam can also be used to produce pálinka”. So…every fruit is suitable for pálinka. Some villagers will tell you that if you really want to enjoy the fine smell and taste of the fruit, you should drink the pálinka at a temperature of 18–23 °C.

Also, pay attention to the form of the glass as for sure it will affect your drinking experience. The tulip-shaped glass is the best one, as the narrow neck will concentrate and magnify all the smell released from the larger bottom of the glass.  
A good home made pálinka has 50-55 % vol. alcohol, and it should not turn white when mixed with water.

In Coltesti and Rimetea, but also in the villages in Trascau Valley and across the whole country, people sell home made pálinka. If you are interested in buying some, look for the gates and fences where is written: ”Elado pálinka” in hungarian or ”Vând țuică” or ”Țuică de vânzare” in romanian, meaning pálinka for sale.