There are two possibilities to approach the summit of Pietrosu on marked trails (neither of them requires any climbing, so good mountaineering boots and typical mountain equipment should be enough outside the winter season):
1) Starting from Borşa /Borsa/, following the blue stripe (described in detail below):
Blue stripe starts east from the center of
Borşa town, after the hospital. Crossing the
Vişeu /
Visó, Wishau/ river, the mark leads on unpaved streets with houses on both sides (with considerable amount of rubbish thrown into the creek by the street...). After a while, the houses get more and more spaced from each other, gradually disappearing. Instead you will find a growing number of shepherd shelters along the cart road the trail follows. While leaving the inhabited area for the green forest, it is hard to escape wondering about the serious waste management problems of those settlements...
Further up on the slope you will find a lot of raspberry and bluberry along the road (depending on the time of year, of course). The best tasting raspberries I have eaten in my life so far! Beware, picking the berries can slow down your pace considerably. Bears also love it, bear this in mind (on the other hand, normally they try to avoid meeting humans if they hear them coming, so talking is generally considered as good "self-defence").
Leaving the raspberry fields, the road will keep winding between pinewoods. After you get out from the forest, you will have a nice view over the
Maramureş Mountains /
Máramarosi-havasok/. From here, there is not much ascend left to reach the depression where the
meteo station (1760 m) is situated (cart road ends). If you plan to stay for more days (which is advised), there is a
designated campsite south from the meteo station houses, by the side of the little creek (
Pietroasa creek) that originates from
Lake Iezer /
Lacul Iezer, Mosolygó-tó/ a little bit further up. The meteo station itself is surrounded by a fence and it depends on the mood of the personnel whether they welcome you in their "territory" or not (by default it's better to walk by).
The trail continues along the creek and passes by Lake Iezer. On the 13th January, 1944, a group of 16 young Hungarian men from Salgótarján were hit here by an avalanche - only one of them survived. In 2003, a memorial wood has been erected by the lake to remember them.
Soon after the memorial, the trail starts winding up the steep northeast face of Pietrosu. When you reach the saddle, the path bifurcates in two directions (both marked by
blue stripe). The one to the south continues towards
Buhăescu Mare (dropping down to
Curmătura Pietrosului saddle, with the
Buhăescu Lakes below to the east). The branch to the west is a short side-trail, leading up to Pietrosu. From here it is about 10 min to the summit. The whole ascend takes about 6 hours.
Transect of the normal route from Borşa |
2) By leaving the main ridge trail at Vf. Rebra on blue stripe northwards:
a)
approaching from the west:
Shortly after
Tarniţa Bătrânei saddle, the
red stripe trail divides into two: one (well marked variant) leads straight to
Tarniţa La Cruce saddle, the second (badly marked) variant follows the main ridge. Choose the second one and through
Vf. Gropilor (2063 m) get to Vf. Rebra (2119 m). There starts the
blue stripe trail towards Borşa town. Follow it through
Vf. Buhăescu Mare (2268 m) until the bifurcation, where the local
blue stripe leaves for the summit.
b)
approaching from the east:
In
Tarniţa La Cruce saddle choose the
red stripe variant following main ridge, which leads up to
Vf. Rebra (2119 m). Then use the description in the
a) section.
Panoramic view towards the east from the summit |
