Crippled CouchSurfer: Day 7
Apoldu de Sus, Romania

Although I'm capable of hobbling around in pitifully short spurts without the use of my plastic cane/ Stephan's PVC didgeridoo these days (about where I thought I'd be recovery-wise on Wednesday, before I realized just how badly I hurt myself), Tatiana has ruled that I'm not ready to begin traveling again. For I know once we leave Apoldu de Sus our pace will quicken, cities will beg to be explored, and bus and train transfers will once again have to be navigated. Just the thought of hurling myself onto or off a too-high train steps with a pair of backpacks around my torso makes me cringe.

So I suppose it's rather fortuitous that our next host in Piteşti has written back that he can only host us for two nights if we were to arrive on the evening of the 28th. This American Peace Corps volunteer is off to attend a Halloween party with friends on Friday night, and will be leaving early in the morning for his 12-hour train ride.

In my mind I've already set a three-night minimum for CouchSurfing. It's just not worth the time and energy to relocate to a city for a single day after an evening arrival.

Although I haven't taken the time to work out the specifics of the onward travel from Piteşti to the Bulgarian border, I'm quite sure such a stopover would've shaved quite a few hours off our now impending big push into the land of Cyrillic script. If Apoldu de Sus turns out to be our last city in Romania I won't think much of it, but Piteşti certainly offered up perks like a broadband internet connection, replacement clothes shopping (for Tatiana), and better connections to Bulgaria.

I could certainly use some speedy Internet to ping our hosts in Bulgaria again, research how to best get to them, and clean out the two-week buildup of unanswered e-mails queuing in my inbox (well over 100 at last count).

So, we'll talk to Stephan tonight and feel him out. Perhaps we'll be relocating on the Friday the 31st (damn, what a great day for Halloween night to fall on), or maybe we can work something out with the American in Piteşti for next week. We shall see how the healing and hosts go.

Update, October 27

Tatiana and Stephan had a little chat this morning, and he's still really quite open to having us stay for as long as we'd like—telling her that he considers us all family. He said that he's taking a trip back to Austria on the 8th, and if we hadn't moved on by that weekend that we were more than welcome to stay for the three days that he'll be gone. This guy is really something else.

So it looks like I'm calling off any travel for the rest of the week, and will try and figure out what our path will look like after the next weekend.

Friday will be the end of our third week here in town, and Tatiana and I have both offered to help pick up part of the cost of the bills for the month. It's really the least we can do.

Explore photos from Romania

Browse more entries