Seaside summer trip

Intro

As i am going through some recent and old pictures stored in a cloud somewhere, I came across some pictures and memories from the summer of 2013 if I remember correctly. There are bunch of pictures from the seaside with me and my best friend Cristina, it was an unforgettable summer and with a lot of experiences and fun, probably the best summer of my life, but wait i will tell you all about it...

Constanta

The city of Constanta is a medium size city based in Romania which is extremely popular during the summer season because of it's opening at the Black Sea and when the touristic season starts and temperatures are getting higher this city is overcrowded with people, most of them youngsters and students or families with children. It is the city to be during summer when everybody has their holidays and they just want to enjoy a seaside vacation.

Costinesti which is a county inside the Constanta city is a touristic destination which became famous during my parents generation. It was well known as the most cheap summer seaside destination with super cheap accommodation and great beaches. So it was like Ibiza nowadays and this tradition continued for years and years until now when my generation ''the millennials'' we are still going there every summer, so we are keeping the tradition alive!

I remember growing up my mom's stories about the summers she used to spend in Costinesti, about the legend behind the wrecked ship which is there for many many years, all the fun times she spend so it was a must for me to go one day there.

Costinesti is situated at about 30 km from the Constanta actual city, it is known as the youngsters city and the main attractions here are the Obelisk and as i told you before the Wrecked ship ''Evangelia'' which has a whole story behind it. The beach side is 1 km longer and before the city it used to be like a countryside place but year after year it become more touristic and yet more developed, many restaurants and hotels were build and nowadays is the top destination. During the summer when the beach is full and all the hotels as well many TV channels they host entertainment programs for young people and various shows.

Best thing about Costinesti is that you can find accommodation at every corner literally. I remember one summer when I went with my cousin and his mom and once we stepped out from the train a bunch of people jumped on us with accommodation offers so it's pretty easy to find and super cheap as well.

This was the first picture I took once I arrived in Costinesti after a 12 hours road trip with my back then Blackberry phone. It was at 6 AM in the morning if I remember correctly. I was so caught by the view and the crystal blue color of the sea it was unbelievable. And ''Evangelia '' ship just standing there like she was waiting for us...

The ship wreck

Evangelia the poor ship which now is a wreck at the Costinesti seaside, was a very famous ship before, it was 1942 when it was build in Northern Ireland, it was launched into the sea in the same year and first it was an American cargo turned into a commercial ship.

During the years she changed the name from Empire Strenght, Redbrook, Saxon Star and eventually Evangelia. The story behind how she arrived here is still a mystery, in 1968 the ship got stocked at about 1 meter and half near the shore in a full sandbank actually the only one in the Costinesti Black sea waters, on the ship they found a small engine packed with a note that was saying ''to Constanta sea port destination'' which was a mystery because nobody knew the ship was about to come this way. Also they found on board a lot of food supplies and products it's like they got ready to go on waters for a long period of time.

The ship got stock in the sand and even though they tried and succeed to put her back on water, it still came back and got stock again which is crazy story but true, and after that they couldn't save it anymore. So the ship wreck is just standing there since the 60's and now it became a symbol of Costinesti.

This days the ship is in bad condition and after a big storm that happened in October last year the ship broke into 2 pieces but is still on the sea standing. And there are trips which you can take from the shore with a boat that goes around the ship, also diving is available for tourists so you can go inside the ship and under because there are stories that underneath there is a water cave with amazing fish.

Back to my summer story

It was summer 2013 and it was unexpected when my best friend Cristina with whom I also went on an Erasmus experience in Portugal ( make sure to check Erasmus Adulthood blog posts) she was getting ready to go to seaside with his sister and brother who returned from England so they planned this great week at Costinesti. Two years before I went to Costinesti with my cousin and my aunt and we had an amazing time as much as I remember so when Cristina asked me to join her I did not hesitate and said yes!

We left for Costinesti in the night at around 10 PM with 2 cars, me Cristina, her sister and her brother with his girlfriend in one car and in the second car some friends of Cristina's brother. The road is quite long from Targu Mures until the seaside, by train is about 12 hours or more and by car well 10 plus stopping and this and that it can become a long journey. We arrived early in the morning and we went straight to our bungalows which we rented. Of course we didn't sleep at all and soon after we unpacked our things we started to explore the city and the beach.

Fun is the main word in Costinesti, if during the day everybody is sitting on the beach trying to get that perfect tan and swim well in the evenings and nights everybody is out on the terraces or clubs. Amazing parties and concerts are taking place every night in the main clubs out there. But the most famous club is called ''Discoteca Tineretului '' which in translation means the Youngster's Disco.

On the boardwalk you will find plenty of small shops with souvenirs or tattoo places, restaurants and various activities like diving or jet skying and many more on daily programs.

During our one week there basically we spent all our mornings on the beach trying to become super brown and having fun on the beach. Me and the girls we were always playing games on the beach or just taking pictures.

Me and Cristina getting a mud treatment...

Evangelia and us

Such great memories

And activities too...

Now that I went through all the pictures and memories I kind of miss our own Black sea and seaside and I don't know why people now rather choose to go to Bulgaria than to Constanta because is the same sea and probably same beaches. They are saying that prices in Romania seaside are much higher that actually Ibiza or other cool places so they choose to go instead Bulgaria which is way cheaper. But I remember when we went it was pretty cheap and overall my entire stay I spent around 150 euros maybe less so I think is affordable.

I really hope that next year I will return to Constanta and spend some days there because we have so many places in Romania that are worth visiting but is sad we rather go abroad and spend more money for the same tourism we can get in our own country. But this is more a publicity thing and how people develop their brand and is unfortunate that Romania's tourism is so under developed.

To my fellows Romanian's please make time and go to Constanta or Mangalia or Tulcea is way better than Bulgaria and at least spend your money in your own country so we can invest in our own tourism.

For those who read my post and of course all my previous stories, thank you guys so much and it was a hell of a ride. Make sure to check my next stories as well!

Good night!