Rimetea

Rimetea, known in Hungarian as Torockó, was an iron-working village whose Székely and German inhabitants grew prosperous enough to build in stone, and the result is an unusually uniform street of white houses with green shutters and shared gable lines. From the 1990s a conservation programme restored the houses to their historical form and imposed rules on materials and colours, work that won a Europa Nostra award and left the village looking coherent in a way Romanian villages rarely do. Above it rises Piatra Secuiului, the Székely Stone, a limestone crag with a path to the top and a striking local phenomenon in which the sun appears to rise twice behind it on certain mornings. There is a small ethnographic museum, a Unitarian church, and guesthouses in restored houses; the whole place is aimed at weekend visitors from Cluj and Budapest.

History

People have lived here since Roman times, and the village grew around iron mining, as both its Hungarian name Torockó, from an old Slavic word for iron ore, and its German name Eisenmarkt recall. It is first mentioned in 1257, was officially renamed Rimetea in 1925, and received the Europa Nostra award in 1999 (Wikipedia, Rimetea).

What you'll find

• The white street - uniform houses with green shutters and carved doors.
• Piatra Secuiului - the crag above the village, with a marked path to the summit.
• The ethnographic museum - iron-working and household collections.
• The Unitarian church - the village church at the centre of the square.

When to go

April to October. Spring and autumn are best for climbing the crag; summer weekends bring day trippers and fill the small parking areas. Winter is quiet with snow on the roofs and the crag, and guesthouses stay open.

Things to know

The village is small and the restoration gives it a slightly curated feel that not everyone likes. It is firmly on the weekend circuit, so quiet is not guaranteed. The climb up Piatra Secuiului is steep and rocky, taking two hours or so round trip. Facilities are limited to guesthouses and a couple of cafés.

Nearby

The Turda salt mine and gorge lie north; Râmeț gorge is south in the same mountains.

Key facts