Before telegraphs, there were bonfires. A Roman frontier needed a way to send a message along a ridge faster than a rider could gallop, and the answer was a chain of watchtowers, each within sight of the next, where a guard could light a fire at night or raise smoke by day to warn of an attack. Trajan's Column shows such towers, with a torch at the top and a ladder. On the Meses hills, in what is now north-western Romania, the line was dense, and each hilltop had to be chosen with a careful eye for what could be seen from where.
Dealul Prislop, one of the grassy hills near Hurez, belongs to this system, and the number 2 in its name suggests that this is the second of several marked places on the same hill or ridge. It is a lesson in how an empire used geography. The sites are part of the World Heritage listing of the Dacian frontier of the Roman Empire.
The ride goes on to Mirsid and La Stramtura, in the Meses range, and the pass called the Meses Gate, where the road squeezes through a gap in the hills and where the Romans built their customs post. The country is pastoral, with meadows, scattered oaks and clumps of hazel, and the roads are narrow, with sudden turns, gravel at the edges and the occasional herd of cattle. Weather can change fast, with fog in the morning and thunderstorms in the afternoon in summer. A rain layer, gloves and patience are the best equipment.
Crasna, the nearest place with a fuel station and a shop, is seventeen kilometres away, and Zalau has larger stores and a repair shop or two. Along the way, the villages have small shops with bread and cold drinks, and the people are curious about visitors. Be careful at dusk, when deer and wild boar cross the roads, and dogs are always active. The hills are at their best in late May, when the meadows are full of flowers, and in early October, when the beech woods turn the slopes bronze.