Photo of the Day by Dreamstime: Bâlea Lake
The Romania Photo of the Day created in partnership with stock photo provider Dreamstime aims to highlight the best of Romania. From stunning landscapes and popular tourist destinations and landmarks to people, traditions, and food, this…
Maiavankline · Journalist
· Updated · 3 min read
The Romania Photo of the Day created in partnership with stock photo provider Dreamstime aims to highlight the best of Romania. From stunning landscapes and popular tourist destinations and landmarks to people, traditions, and food, this series helps you discover Romania one photo at a time. This week, we put the focus on Romanian mountain lakes.
In the heart of the Făgăraș Mountains in the county of Sibiu lies the great glacial lake called Bâlea Lake.
Located at the high altitude of 2034 meters, the lake has an expanse of over 45,000 square meters and is surrounded by the beautiful scenery of mountain crests and terraces. (Photo source - click on the number to get to the photo 43925961 / Balea Lake © Toma Bonciu | Dreamstime.com)
The area was declared a nature reserve in 1932 and is home to protected species of both flora and fauna, such as the Edelweiss and the Dark Vanilla Orchid, or the Eurasian Lynx and the Black Mountain Goat.
Today, Bâlea Lake is one of the region’s most popular attractions. Understandably so, as there are many sights to see here, as descoperalocuri.ro tells us:
Sights to see in the area of Bâlea Lake include the lake itself, the Bâlea Waterfall, the Goat Lake and Waterfall, the Bâlea Lake Cabin, Moldoveanu Peak (which is the tallest mountain peak in Romania), and the Ice Hotel and Ice Church that are built near the lake in winter (the first of their kind in Eastern Europe).
The area can be visited all year round as it offers a wealth of leisure activities, such as hiking, rock climbing, cycling, paragliding, fishing, hunting, or bungee-jumping, during warm weather, and skiing, snowboarding, and ice skating in the winter.
Bâlea Lake is easily reachable by car via the famous Transfăgărășan Road and can be reached just as easily by cable car, which can be taken from the Bâlea Waterfall.
The lake's name has its own origin story, which
Free newsletters
Romania, in your inbox before your first coffee.
Get the Daily — the morning briefing, free, in English, unsubscribe anytime. Want business, real estate or travel digests too? Pick your newsletters →
