Travel Guide Berca

The mud volcanoes (Vulcanii Noroioși) of Berca, a village of 7,500 inhabitants some 30 km northwest of Buzău, are the region's major attraction. The most interesting site is called Pâcle Mari. Among the wooded hills, in the middle of a lunar landscape, small craters rise up from gray slopes, spewing out a grayish mush and forming small viscous flows. The Vulcanii Noroioși geological reserve is a fine example of the phenomenon of active eruption of gaseous hydrocarbons from the earth's crust. Everywhere, the ground presents surprisingly smooth or tortured shapes. You can smear your skin with this beneficial mud, as the Romanians do. As well as the volcanoes themselves, the road leading to them passes through beautiful scenery: hills sometimes so green you'd think you were in Ireland, fields being worked, numerous animals on the road, carts full of hay or even rudimentary bridges suspended over the river.