Some summer weekend back in 2012 my friend Cosmin invited me to a camping trip to the Varghis Gorges. I was pretty busy so I didn’t say yes, but I’d never been there before so I didn’t say no. “We’ll be there in case you make up your mind”.

And I did.

I got to the gorge at night only to find that there was no gsm signal and no way to find my friends. But the place was amazing so I just wandered around taking photos.

When I got to see the full moon nicely contouring the scenery I stopped to take a photo, but suddenly I heard my name shouted from far away.

I answered and few minutes later Cosmin joined me with a happy welcome. “Who else could drive a samurai in this place at this hour?”

Photography tips & tricks

I took these Samurai pics helped by Cosmin who was lighting up the samurai, while I was flashing very shortly the samurai headlights for some extra details on the ground. You can check two other failed tries below.

I joined my friends and found out they were settled on a clearing right next to a scouts camp.

A few beers and stories later my friends were all gone to sleep and I was still up for the party (I never was too good at timing) so I just joined the scouts by the campfire.

And I spent the night being a sentry with the few scouts and we talked about nature and animals (with an accent on bears) and we played games and we studied the sky and overall had the best possible time.

The morning light caught me awake and happy to shoot some photos with the fog on my lens creating the cool fire hallow.

I got to sleep a couple of hours and when I woke up it was already evening so I quickly got on the track to visit the gorge.

After the hiking trip I just got to the samurai for a lovely sunset trip back to the camp.