Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
308 km from Spermezeu to Spermezeu, about 6 h 35 of riding. It goes by way of Church of the Holy Archangels, Kuziy - Trybushany and back through Church of the Holy Archangels. It crosses from Romania into Ukraine - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. The line favours views over speed.
Scenic road chapters
Romania Maramures Wooden Churches Route
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 80 km this is Romania Maramures Wooden Churches Route, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Chapter facts
Length
80 km
Named road
Romania Maramures Wooden Churches Route
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Spermezeu - Lazuri
Spermezeu is a village in the hilly country of western Bistriţa-Năsăud county, in northern Transylvania, where low ridges covered with orchards, hayfields and beech woods roll between the Someş valley and the Ţibleş mountains. The site called Spermezeu - Lazuri belongs to the series of places along the northern edge of the Roman province of Dacia, part of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire listed in Romania in 2024. Here the Romans watched the border with watchtowers and small fortifications on hilltops, and though little remains above ground, the commanding views explain why these spots were chosen.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Spermezeu - Lazuri is where the day begins. Next is Church of the Holy Archangels.
2. Church of the Holy Archangels
Șurdești is a small village in the hills of Maramureș, in the north of Romania, and its wooden church of the Holy Archangels Michael and Gabriel is famous for its spire. Built in the eighteenth century from oak logs, the church has a steep double roof covered in shingles and a slender tower that rises far above the trees, among the tallest wooden church towers in the region. It is one of eight wooden churches of Maramureș listed by UNESCO in 1999, each a masterpiece of local carpentry, built by village craftsmen using traditional techniques.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Church of the Holy Archangels comes up about 74 km into the recorded legs. Next is Kuziy - Trybushany.
3. Kuziy - Trybushany
The river Tisza runs fast and green out of the Ukrainian Carpathians, and for many kilometres it forms the border between Romania and Ukraine. On the Ukrainian bank, the forests of Kuziy and Trybushany are among the primeval beech woods protected in the Carpathian Biosphere Reserve and listed by UNESCO as part of the Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathians and Other Regions of Europe. From the Romanian side, around Valea Vișeului, you look across the river at steep, wooded slopes where the trees have grown and died without interference for centuries.