Places in Bucharest - across the city and along river Dambovita

The legend says that Dambovita used to be the young wife of shepard Bucur and together they established a settlement which became later the city of Bucharest.

Like any respectable European capital, Bucharest is watered and occasionally flooded by a river, Dambovita, which crosses it diagonallly, from NW to SE. Initially quite meager, the river was enriched with the waters of river Arges when the former dictator Ceausescu was building a channel between the Danube and Bucharest (construction which, although almost finalized, came to an abrupt end after the revolution in '89)

Dambovita enters Bucharest from village Chiajna and starts off gloriously with Lacul Morii (Watermill Lake), the biggest in Bucharest with its area of 240 hectares. It is a favorite spot for jogging and walking on the high shores, occasional fishing, summer bathing and splashing around or doing some impromptu "laundry".

From the lake and through dam Ciurel, Dambovita starts flowing into the city, along the roads called Splaiul Independentei and Splaiul Unirii, for 22 km, ending in Vitan-Barzesti and highway A2 to Constanta.

During the last 100 years it had lots of changes, the bed of the river being initially paved with wood, and modernized gradually - it has a concrete bed only for 20 years now. The meadow is very wide (2,5 km), and unfortunately the ground is very permissive with water and causes infiltrations in some basements during the rainy season.

The river had 12 bridges from the beginning of its modernization period (1889) and they still exist. After dam Ciurel it goes down students' campus Regie,

goes past Semanatoarea - Grozavesti, along hypermarket Carrefour and approaches (p)residential area Cotroceni, close to Botanical Garden, Municipal Hospital, the mighty ruins of Radio House, past Heroes' Bridge and next to the Opera.

This is a spot worth a longer tour, to see church Elefterie and the ship-like building of the Opera Center or the building of the Opera House with the bronze statue of George Enescu, the great Roomanian composer. From the bridge you can already see the center, with the blue Financial Plaza and the glass dome of the C.E.C. building on Victory Road.

A little bit down the road the horizon is filled upwards by the People's House (Casa Poporului)

... and the green stretch of Parc Izvor where people walk or do some sports on the grass and the alleys. Across the street there's Theater Bulandra.

Going downstream we go across Piata Natiunile Unite (UN Square), past the Palace of Justice and the humble looking Manuc's Inn. The river goes underground to cross Unirii Square and gets out in the open again next to Unirea Shopping Center, then makes a right turn towards the Chamber of Commerce.

After that there's a quarter called Timpuri Noi, a little bit dusty and not very inspiring for a walk, but which has two big universities: Dimitrie Cantemir si Nicolae Titulescu.

This is the beginning of the end of Dambovita in Bucharest. The area is very crowded in daytime (because of the car fair and bazaar in Vitan) and it's quite industrial (not to count the garbage dump in the area)

After the greenish blue entry with Lacul Morii, the exit is a little bit dirty and smelly into the great wide open of the fields along highwat A2. Or, if you come from Constanta, you have to reverse the route.

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