Picturesque (and picture-less) Field Trip!

Today we went on probably our best field trip ever -- and I forgot the memory card for my camera, much to my dismay.  So I will use postcards we bought, some videos we took with our Flip camera, and lots and lots of words to describe it instead!

Old Orhei (Orheiul Vechi) is the site of several layers of history;  various fortresses and citadel walls were built here, even as far back as hundreds of years before Christ! There were also public baths hundreds of years ago, as well as a monastery made out of caves in the side of the cliff.

 Today there is a beautiful church, the monastery in which monks still live, and a small indoor museum that had artifacts from many different centuries.  (We saw things like earrings from 300 B.C.!)  It's also just a beautiful place to walk around, hike, and do some rock climbing!  So we did all that.

Here we are approaching the top of the hill where the monastery is:

We saw a little entrance in the side of the hill, outside of which a long-bearded monk was working on some floor mats of some kind.  When we approached, he spoke to us quietly in Romanian, and since the only words we could pick out was "bine" (good) and "copii" (children), we figured we were allowed to go in.  (And we'd seen a couple of other people go in ahead of us). 

This is what we saw inside:

The monastery opens right up on the side of the cliff -- which is why I was freaking out when the boys went right out to the edge.  It was a looooong way down to the river below!  But it did look like a nice place to pray, if there were no reckless boys around.  The caves were fascinating -- Pete says it's the coolest monastery he's ever seen.

While in both the monastery complex and the church area (below) we saw signs that indicated women should have their heads covered, so I cooperated:

What a peaceful place -- and a windy place, located at the top of the hill.

After exploring at the top of the hill, we descended down to the river and explored from the bottom of the cliffs.  Rock climbing was the big attraction at that point -- Strider made it back up to the top while I tried not to watch.

All in all it was not only a beautiful trip, but also probably the strangest one we've ever been on. On our way from Chisinau out to Orhei, we passed chickens, goats, cows, sheep, shepherds, geese, and a wild turkey -- along the "highways!"   Several times we passed people on horse-drawn wagons -- including one here in our neighborhood in the city. We also saw numerous public wells along the highways, and in the villages we went through.  And we drove on dirt roads through a village that looked like it belonged in another century.

I cannot believe I forgot my camera card!!  But it was a great trip anyway.  :)