Tag: guide
We see it more and more often: groups of mountain biking friends coming for a week of riding our trails in the Romanian Carpathian Mountains in search for an alternative to the tried and tested TransAlps experiences. Sometimes there is a more personal reason, like in the case of Gabriel who left Romania as a teenager, but always wanting to come back to experience the Carpathians on the bike. He lured his mtb buddies from Germany into a leap in the unknown, and here they were. End of July, six…
Carpathian Peaks is the latest addition to the list of programs here on mtbtours.ro and it is proving quite popular. All my tours are perfectly defined by the UP. DOWN. REPEAT headline, but it is the Carpathian Peaks where the UP part is the most consistent, with many a steep, intensive climbs, including bike pushing and bike carrying. I had expected for this tour to attract more hard-core mountain bikers, like this gang from Scotland (see reports here and here). To my surprise, the concept of working your way up…
Wherever he shows up with his wild, white beard, Orbach is making an appearance. He was called ZZ Top, or a direct descendent of Durin, king of Dwarves. More often than not, he is called Santa. Pretty much like Santa, Orbach travels a lot, albeit for very different reasons. His long standing passion is mountain biking on nice trails around the world. The list is rather impressive. Turkey, Croatia, Spain, Italy, Switzerland, to name a few. He just returned home from a bike trip in Japan when his friend David…
Claus's smile and his three words sentence say it all. "This was epic." He is looking back to the winding trail coming down from Ciucaș Peak, along steep, grassy slopes flanked by some weirdly shaped rock formations. There is a hint of hot metal in the air, and his eyes are gleaming with delight. It was hard work getting up there. Serious pedaling on technical terrain, followed by push and carry biking. The kind of uphill that makes you wonder if this is really worth it. It definitely does, and…
"You don't get many returning customers, do you?!", Muzza asked me while hike-a-biking up a steep, rocky couloir on the way to Ciucaș peak, during our 2023 tour, It was, obviously, more of a rhetorical question, in more ways than one. My regular guests won't return, even if they thoroughly enjoyed their time spent in Romania. A good part of their motivation into coming to places like our Carpathian Mountains is to discover new places. The next adventure, by definition, should be somewhere new. But Muzza, and Iain, and Robert,…
Sometimes we forget about just enjoying the mountains. Which is what brought me (you?) to mountain biking in the first place. Now it is a lot about the flow, the grit, the ride, the shredding. About the width of the tires, the number of clicks in the rebound or the number of teeth on the granny gear. The six days of biking with Alda and Ronan put back the accent on the mountains, and less on the biking. We were blessed with great weather, so we properly enjoyed the great…
Traveling all the way from New Zealand, Tom, Peter and Adam spent the first part of their mountain biking adventure in the Swiss and Italian Alps. It was Andrew's idea, the fourth member of the party, to try something off the beaten track in the last part of their European holiday. Hence the quite unusual sight of four kiwis riding their bikes on the Romanian mountain trails. Adding to the unusual element of the trip, it was the first time we combined regular, "unplugged" mountain bikes with an e-bike. We…
UP. DOWN. REPEAT stands true no matter the season. They say ski touring is the winter version of mountain biking. Or is it the other way around? The mountains we are riding on during spring, summer and autumn are ideal for ski touring and back country skiing. While the hiking and biking trails are covered in snow, endless freeride opportunities arise. Looking for a guided ski touring or backcountry skiing trip in Central Transylvania. Romania? You are in the right place. Are you just entering the realm of ski-touring? Then…
Bikers from all over the world come to ride our trails, and most are very much into mountain biking, bringing over their beloved equipment, and showing incredible technical and physical skills. Some are less into biking and more into spending memorable experiences together with old friends. The demands of the mountain biking we are offering in our tours might take them by surprise. But this never stood in the way of a proper jolly time. The intensity of the climbs and the technicity of descents are swiftly turned into challenges,…
There is a good chance you don’t. You don't need a guide when you ride at home, on familiar trails (you might benefit from a mtb instructor, though). You don't necessarily need a guide when you hit the trails in a bikepark. Standardized signing, comprehensive maps, and hordes of fellow riders will lend you a helping hand in finding your way through the unfamiliar terrain. (Keep in mind the mtb instructor idea, though). You don’t need a guide when you are keen on exploring new places on your own, getting…
