The Someșul Mare valley around Năsăud was a frontier long before the Habsburgs made it one again. The Romans built watchtowers on the hills here to guard the northern edge of Dacia, and Salva - Dealul Dumbravă, the hill of the oak grove near the village of Salva, is one of the sites included in the UNESCO listing of the Dacian frontier in 2024. Sixteen centuries later, the Habsburg empire turned the region into a military border district, and the Năsăud border regiment, made up of local Romanian peasants, guarded the Carpathian passes in return for privileges and education.
That tradition of schooling left a mark. Năsăud, a town of about ten thousand, became a centre of Romanian culture in Transylvania, and two of the great Romanian writers grew up nearby: the poet George Coșbuc, born in the village of Hordou, now named after him, and the novelist Liviu Rebreanu, who spent his childhood in Maieru. Their memorial houses can be visited. Salva itself is a village of a few thousand, where the railway from Cluj to the north crosses the valley.
The riding is good and varied. The valley road follows the Someșul Mare with gentle curves, and further east, toward Rodna and the Rodna mountains, the landscape becomes more dramatic, with peaks over two thousand metres and forests reaching down to the river. The road over the Rotunda pass leads to Bucovina, and other roads climb toward Maramureș. Surfaces vary greatly, from new asphalt to potholes, and there are carts, cows and dogs on the road. Summer brings thunderstorms, and winter is snowy and cold. Autumn colours in the beech forests are superb.
Năsăud has fuel, shops and restaurants. Food here is typical of northern Transylvania: sour soups with lovage, polenta with cheese and sour cream, smoked meats and plum brandy. Traditional costumes are still worn for festivals, with their distinctive hats decorated with peacock feathers. The Roman site is modest, but the hill offers a view over the valley that the soldiers on watch would recognise. Climb up if you can, then roll back down to Năsăud for a strong coffee.