Video the disturbing secrets of bicaz lakes. How the “pearls” from the Eastern Carpathians appeared

A 90 -kilometer road through the Eastern Carpathians, between the cities of Gheorgheni (Harghita) and Piatra Neamț (Neamț) offers travelers the opportunity to see some of the most spectacular dwellings in Romania: Red Lake, Bicaz Gorge and Lake Bicaz.

25 kilometers from Gheorgheni, Red Lake in Harghita County, also called Ghilcoș Gyilkos Lake (no Hungarian, it means a killer), has an unusual story.

The lake with an area of ​​over ten hectares and a length of almost three kilometers formed at almost 1,000 meters altitude, following an earthquake recorded at the beginning of 1838, which led to the collapse of a slope of the Suhard.

At the beginning of its formation, the lake was much larger, but over time the natural dam eroded, and the water level stabilized. It is one of the few lakes formed in this way in Romania. And Lake Bălătău from Bacău county was formed in the Nemira Mountains, after a landslide registered in 1883.

The legends of the red lake

A century later, the place in the Hăşmaşul Mare Mountains (Eastern Carpathians) had become one of the most sought after resorts in Romania.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eysjtyhsto

“” Red Lake is one of the resorts that, at a rapid pace, have acquired a fairly rich dowry in villas and villas, located both near the road strap and in the wild places of the mountain. The red lake has a volcanic origin, it appeared a hundred years ago when a forested region. Their peaks of the cold waters.informing Romania magazine, in 1938.

The legend of the lake says that the landslide that led to its formation would have destroyed an entire village, and the water gathered in would have been reddened by the blood of the locals. Another legend says that on the lake shore a haiduc would have housed, sought for crimes, which finally found its end here.

“The Red Lake-from which the resort took its appointment-once called Lake Ghilcoş. In Romanian the Lake of the killer. A romantic and mystery name. It could not be otherwise! Here in the bottom of the codrii, it will ever be hidden the end and the soul, who knows what the world could not allow. to the soul.”Inform the Gazeta of Transylvania in 1937.

Bicaz Gorges, “Gura Iadului”

The travelers arrive at the Red Lake resort on the Road of Bicaz (DN 12), an old transcarpal connection between the historical regions of Transylvania and Moldova, which crosses the Bicaz Gorge.

The approximately 15 kilometers of the gorge in the Hăşmaşul Mare Mountains, between the Roşu Lake and the town of Bicaz are some of the most attractive keys in Romania.

At the beginning of the last century the Bicaz passenger was also known as the “Gura Iadului”. A tunnel was built then, on the hardest accessible portion of the keys, in order to be transited with cars.

“In fact, the road that descends to the Bicaz Valley takes you quickly to the bottom of some gaps, it can not be seeded. The mourning of a mountain, which stopped in place Bicazul, forcing him to drown a forest whose trees are still standing today. ” reported the geographer Simion Mehedinți, in the volume “Romania”, from 1923.

Since the early 1950s, the Bicaz area has gone through broad transformations. Here, about 60 kilometers from the Red Lake, one of the largest hydropower complexes in Romania was built. Here is Lake Izvorul Muntelui – Bicaz, with an area of ​​over 30 square kilometers, arranged on the course of the Bistriţa river.

Over 20 localities, in which 18,000 people lived were displaced for the establishment of the accumulation lake. The villages of Răpiunea, Cârnu, Reteş from Neamt County have completely disappeared, together with their cemeteries. In other villages, like Hangu and Fârţagi, guided by priests, the locals have unearthed their dead and moved them to the cemeteries on the hills, climbing on a so-called “road of the dead”.

Thousands of Romanians worked on the Bicaz yard

Over 15,000 people were brought to Bicaz to work at the great hydropower complex on the Bistrița river, which included the Bicaz dam, 127 meters, its accumulation lake of over 30 square kilometers and the hydroelectric plants, with a installed power of 210 MW.

“Bicazul, the first great hydropower achievement in Romania, also called the Romanian Hydroenergetics School was a real school for the hydroenergetic specialists who, later, made the other great constructions on Argeș, Lotru and the Danube.”, Informs Hidroelectrica.

In the first years of work, many of the workers came from the prisoners, either they were military or members of the forced labor detachments.

“Several thousand people are employed in the extension of the Piatra Neamț-Bicaz railway to the Bicaz cement factory. Three-four thousand prisoners form two of the work companies, they being politically or alleged saboators. Both companies are accommodated in a camp on the edge of the Romanian village. guarded by armed soldiers with revolvers. It showed a secret note, from 1952, kept in the CIA archives.

The works at the Bicaz Hydroenergetic Complex were completed in 1960.