Rădăcinești is a quiet village belonging to Berislăvești, tucked into the hills on the east side of the Olt valley in Vâlcea county. The word cetate on the label means fortress, and like many such names in Romania it points to an old fortified height above the village, the kind of place where earthworks and a few stones are all that is left of people who once watched this valley closely. You come for the setting rather than for ruins you can walk through.
The setting is good. Down below, the Olt forces its way south through the Carpathians in one of the great river gorges of the country, and the DN7 follows it. That main road is beautiful and tiresome in equal measure: cliffs, river and monasteries on one side, a steady stream of lorries on the other. Climbing away from it towards Berislăvești and Sălătrucel brings instant relief, with narrow lanes through orchards and plum trees, small bridges over side streams and views back to the forested ridges of the Cozia massif. The surface on these local roads is often rough and the corners blind, so treat them gently.
This corner of Wallachia is thick with history. Cozia Monastery, founded by Mircea the Elder in the late fourteenth century, sits on the Olt a short ride away, and Mircea himself lies buried there. Further west, Horezu Monastery, built for Constantin Brâncoveanu, is a World Heritage site and the reason for the name on one of these rides; the village of Horezu is also known for its pottery, glazed in brown, cream and green with roosters and spirals. Gorge, fortress hill, monastery: the Olt has always been a highway as well as a barrier.
The nature here is mid-mountain Romania at its gentlest. Beech and oak woods, meadows full of flowers in June, and in autumn the smell of plum brandy being distilled in back yards. The Cozia massif rising above the gorge is a national park with steep, broken cliffs.
For fuel and food, Călimănești, about nine kilometres away on the Olt, is the practical choice: it is a spa town with stations, shops and plenty of guesthouses around Căciulata. Fill up there before wandering into the side valleys, where shops are small and fuel non-existent.