Today ended up being the day of caves … but let’s go step by step …

The first challenge of the day was already waiting for us before breakfast – i.e. to go to reception to get the breakfast ticket. With the ticket already indicating the choice of breakfast and the English breakfast menu being lost over night, things turned out into a bit of gamble … some just picked a number, others ended up with a poor receptionist translating the Romanian respectively Russian version.

Once the ticket was issued it was down to the restaurant … and it was here that our day of caves would be starting. We made it downstairs to the restaurant and eventually ended up in an artificial cave and in the middle of an Orthodox church service. A short corridor on the other side of the service led to the breakfast room – with the day of caves starting with a breakfast in a cave.

After breakfast we got onto the van and were soon on our way to Orhei Vechi and Orhei Vechi Monastery. After about an hour we stopped at a viewpoint overseeing the valley, before continuing to the little museum inside the valley.

A short drive later we left the van again and walked up the hill towards the cave chapel of Cerkiev Peştere. We entered the chapel through a small tunnel, made it down a number of steps. After a look around, we continued into a neighboring cave, which used to house the monastic cells back in the days, when this was a thriving monastery. From the darkness of the cells we made it to the little balcony just outside the chapel – to get a great view of the river and the valley.

We did climb the stairs back up again and continued further uphill, to see the cross and to the continue to nearby church (Biserica Sfânta Maria).

After our visit to the church we made it down to the village for a quick look around the little museum, followed by a walk through the village back to the parking lot.

A short 10 minute drive got us to Trebujeni, where we had lunch in the house under the rock (which probably counts for half a cave) – plus a master class in the preparation of a local cookie classic (which I will probably never repeat – considering it consists of 33% lard).

After lunch we were heading back toward Chişinău – however were barely touching town, as we were passing around it … the next destination being … a cave …