Bucharest to Vidraru Dam transfer                              3 hours

Vidraru Dam & lake                                                         1 hours

Transfagar                                                                        1,5 hours

Balea lake – Lunch                                                            1,5 hour

Balea waterfall                                                                  0,5 hour

Other breaks                                                                      30 minutes

Balea waterfall to Bucharest transfer to                        3,5  hours

Duration:                                                                             12 hours

Schedule benchmarks are approximate, depend on traffic and the time for visiting landmarks

Take a one day trip from Bucharest to visit Transfagarasan mountain road, Vidraru Dam and lake, Balea lake and Balea waterfall.

This is a private tour, the vehicle is available only for your group. It is recommended for families with children – we offer free child seat and you can stop along the way whenever you want. In case you travel with a child please provide us your child seat requirements. In accordance with the legal provisions in force, the child seat is mandatory.

There is no age limit for this experience.

You can select the pick-up time between 7:00 and 09:00 AM. 

You can have this experience with or without a professional guide. For a full experience we recommend to have your personal guide. If you don’t need a professional guide you will have a professional English/Italian speaking driver that is happy to share some Romanian lifestyle, culture and history and help you choose a very good restaurant for your lunch.

Visiting days and opening hours.

Daily between 1 of June and 30 of September.

Depending on weather condition Transfagarasan can be closed.

Transfagarasan mountain road

The Transfăgărășan is a paved mountain road crossing the southern section of the Carpathian Mountains of Romania. It has national-road ranking and is the second-highest paved road in the country after the Transalpina. It starts near the village of Bascov, near Pitești, and stretches 90 kilometres (56 mi) to the crossroad between the DN1 and Sibiu, between the highest peaks in the country, Moldoveanu and Negoiu.

The road, built in the early 1970s as a strategic military route, connects the historic regions of Transylvania and Wallachia. Ceaușescu wanted to ensure quick military access across the mountains in case of a Soviet invasion.

Built mainly by military forces, the road had a high financial and human cost. Work was carried out in an alpine climate, at an elevation of 2,000 metres (6,600 ft), using roughly six million kilograms (5,900 long tons; 6,600 short tons) of dynamite, and employing junior military personnel who were untrained in blasting techniques. Many workers died; official records state that only 40 soldiers lost their lives, but unofficial estimates by workers put the number in the hundreds.

Vidraru Dam & lake

Vidraru Dam is a dam in Romania. It was completed in 1966 on the Argeş River and creates Lake Vidraru. The arch dam was built with the primary purpose to produce hydroelectricity. The dam’s height is 166 metres, the arch length 305 meters and it can store 465 million cubic metres of water. The reservoir has a total shoreline (perimeter) length of 28 km.

Balea lake

Bâlea Lake is a glacier lake situated at 2,034 m of altitude in the Făgăraș Mountains, in central Romania, in Cârțișoara, Sibiu County. There are two chalets opened all the year round, a meteorological station and a mountain rescue (Salvamont) station. It is accessible by car on the Transfăgărășan road during the summer, and the rest of the year by a cable car from the “Bâlea Cascadă” chalet.

In 2006, the first ice hotel in Eastern Europe was built in the vicinity of the lake.