I’ve been giving a lot of thought into what title to give this article. The irony is that the closer to home I need to travel, the harder it is to find a good, reliable public transportation option. Although I do have a driving license, I am not a fan of driving in Romania – or a fan of Romanian drivers, may I say? – so I live my life in the city without a car. Which saves money and my nerves…but when we want to get to festivals and events close to Arad, this gets a bit weird and hard.

Case in point? The Folk Festival at Pecica, county of Arad. Pecica is located just 24 km from Arad. You would think that the public transportation options are endless and really easy to find. WRONG! First of all, neither me or Alex knew about a bus or a train going there. I’ve never been and he’s always been either by car or hitchhiked. I assumed there would be an alternative…but boy did it take long to figure it out.

I was about to give up on going until someone asked a question on Facebook and we got the answer. There is a train. But it’s not run by CFR – the state-owned company – it’s run by Regiotrans. So looked up the schedule and found out it left from the 3rd railways stop in Arad. Better yet, there’s a mock-up stop near Cora, the supermarket, about 5 km out of Arad (and yes, not exactly many public transportation options to go there, either). The only train departing from the main railway station is around 2 pm because they work on the rails. The other trains can be boarded near Cora. Oh dear!

Enter alternative : the bus. Now, we are not fans of buses but on a 40 min trip we can stand them. So turns out buses also leave from the Old Bus Stop (near Atrium). But there are 4 buses per day and we will be forced to take the 3:30 p.m. one (we travel with a friend who will sing there and needs to be there at 7 p.m.).

On the way back though, it’s going to be a challenge. We might have found a ride back by car (someone offered) but otherwise it’s a train at 10:27 p.m. (and from Cora we’ll probably take a taxi which will increase the costs!) or staying overnight in our tent (very tempting).

I never get it. Why does it take ages and spy work to find public options so close to town while it’s SO EASY to find them in other country? Sure, we tend to travel to well known places but in civilized countries, it’s much easier to find the travel information you need.

I’ve always argued that Romania is beautiful but we lack infrastructure. We also lack information. Or making it available for travelers. Not to mention that the organizers of the event could have pointed out the means of transportation from major cities close by (which is Arad, by the way).

Photo via Flickr