Bucovina is a territory in the North-Eastern part of Romania and it’s famous for its painted monasteries that are part of the UNESCO World Heritage. I wanted to go and see them a long time ago but to do this long drive (460 km from Bucharest) alone wasn’t very appealing. So I convinced Judit to come with me; it was an easy job!
The painted monasteries were built mostly in the 15th-16th centuries and they exhibit a unique architecture and painting style both on the inner and the outer walls. It’s amazing how well some of the outside paintings were preserved withstanding the weather for all those centuries.
The paintings show scenes from the Bible and they are like comic strips telling stories.
The outside walls were painted because after a while the congregation was too large to fit into the church for the services. Even today, people stay and pray outside during the service. The dome of the church was built in a unique way as well to give the church special acoustic qualities so the sermon could be heard outside as well. Today the special acoustics is helped by loudspeakers!
The Monastery of Voronet (1488) is one of the most beautiful ones!
Outside the monastery we met some nice doggies but they were very lazy!
The Bucovinian landscape is also very beautiful, too bad we didn’t have more time to take some walks!
When we stopped to take pictures of the landscape a friendly face was watching us.
We also stopped in Suceava, the main city of the area. It once was the capital of Moldova. Today it is the capital of the county of the same name. It has a nice village museum showing how peasants lived in the old days.
