Blog

Autumn is starting

There is no sugar coating the facts: summer is over, autumn is starting. However, we are still far
from the cold nights and chilly days of October, so vacation time is not just yet over.
The temperatures are friendly, the sun is shining regularly and the nights are warm enough to enjoy
a romantic fire in the fireplace. It is the best time to enjoy hiking the forest and trails around
Suncuius and Zece Hotare.

The routes to the caves in the area, Vadu Crisului, Suncuius,, Meziad or Farcu will now be free, so
you can actually enjoy the nature around you instead of walking in line with many others. The wild
beach in Suncuius is, from now on, wild again, and a great spot for your memorable Instagram
moment.

The surrounding forests are boasting with all sorts of mushrooms, from the delicious porcini to the
beautiful, yet deadly, fly agaric (amanita muscaria). A hike this time of year is a pleasure fot both the
amateur chef and the plant photographer. Other treats of the woods these days are blackberries and
other sorts of wild berries.

Should you book a stay at Dolina Village, in Zece Hotare, you can spend your time doing all of the
above, or simply do nothing but enjoy the silence of the nature surrounding the place.
If you’re still not convinced that this is the place to spend your autumn vacation, from the 15th of september you can book our traditional houses and glamping tents for low-season prices.

The making of a haystack in Zece Hotare

Living in the country means we get to take part in all sorts of agricultural activities. During the
summers, in Zece Hotare, everyone makes hay for their farm animals; mainly cows and sheep.
Although the most common way of hay making nowadays is with a tractor (cutting the grass, making
bales), some of our neighbours stick to the tradition of making haystacks. This year, we decided to
learn how to make a haystack ourselves, thus we asked our neighbours to come and teach us the
whole process.

We admit to have cut the grass with a tractor, but followed the rest of the traditional steps. We
started Saturday morning by gathering the hay with rakes in long lines. Once that was done, all lines
had to be turned in heaps, ideally using wooden hay forks. Honestly, this was the actual hard part of
the job, since it took us about six hours on a very, very, hot day.

It was time for the fun to begin: our neighbour Marius and his horse Dinu have arrived to help
moving the heaps and start building on the haystack. Of course, we knew that Marius and Dinu have
been working like this for years, still we were impressed by the ease with which they pulled each
each heap to the “building site”.

We started to make the haystack by putting a pole into the ground and building a small floor around
it. The hay should not be put straight on the ground since the humidity can make rot quickly. Next,
we started to add hay around the pole, in layers. Marius was the one to climb on the stack and make
sure the hay is well pressed and stable on every layer, while the others kept putting more grass
around the pole. Once the haystack is almost done, there is one more thing to be done: the hay
needs to be combed down using a rake, ensuring a smooth surface water will flow down on. We
finished by topping the stack with a plastic bag, allowing no water down the pole. Job well done!
So why go through the trouble of building a haystack when we could make bales? Well, for the
experience for one; we believe it is important to keep the local traditions alive. Secondly, it surely
looks great between our old vacation houses and gives something extra to the landscape in general.
Thirdly, we might need the hay later on, and a stack is the way to keep it dry and useable for years,
without needing to store it inside or covering it up.

Haystacks are still to be seen in the hills surrounding Suncuius, in Zece Hotare and the mountain area
of Bihor region.

The special offers of the 2022 season

Casa Stramba - Dolina Village, Zece Hotare, Suncuius

The mid-week deal: 5 nights for the price of 4

Your mid-week stay begins on Sunday, from 5 pm and ends on Friday, before 11 am.
Five nights is actually the amount of time you need here at Dolina Village, if you want to both rest
and explore the surroundings.

You can visit the wild beach in Șuncuiuș, and enjoy it on a peaceful day instead of the very busy weekend days. You’ll have the chance to visit the most spectacular caves in Bihor region (Meziad, Farcu, Vadu-Crisului) and not have to deal with long, time consuming, lines. You will have the possibility to visit the traditional pottery center in Vadu-Crisului, on a moment when the potter has all the time to explain his proces of creation, but also the history of this old local craft.
Are you into mountainbiking or hiking? Then you have a wide choice of marked trails in the surrounding areas or you can just freely explore the forests and hills of our village, Zece Hotare.

Prices mid-week:
Casa Bătrână (max 4 people) – 280 euro
Casa Strâmbă (max 4 people, ideally 2) – 240 euro
Casa Marie-Jose (max 6 people) – 280 euro
Glamping tent (max. 4 people) – 220 euro

Prices full-week: 6 nights for the price of 7, thus 2 days extra to enjoy all of the above!
Casa Bătrână – 420 euro
Casa Strâmbă – 360 euro
Casa Marie-Jose – 420 euro
Dolina Glamping – 330 euro

We hope to welcome you soon at Dolina Village, in Șuncuiuș, district Bihor, where you can rent one of our three restored old houses or one of our cozy glamping tents. The minimum stay in both the houses and tents is two nights.

Nightly rates:
Casa Bătrână – 70 euro
Casa Strâmbă – 60 euro
Casa Marie-Jose – 70 euro
Dolina Glamping – 55 euro

Contact:

    Route Discription:

    For a quick arrival it is ESSENTIAL that you drive trough Suncuius. In Suncuius follow the Signs Zece Hotare. In the first hairpin you turn right, your GPS probably tells you a different story here. After this you have about 5 kilomters of asphalted road. Just follow the road as straight as possible. The last 2 kilometers are without asphalt but in good condition for all cars. As soon as you see a small wooden sign "Casa Batrana" turn right. This is where we live. We will bring you to your house or tent!

    Our Adress:

    Zece Hotare 97

    417568 Suncuius

    Email:
    info@dolinavillage.com

    Young entrepreneurs helping each other out

    Starting up a business is not easy for anyone. The story is no different for us and our project, Dolina Village. We’ve spent the past two years building and remodeling old houses and platforms for the glamping tents. Except for almost all our time, building this business also cost us quite some money.

    At the end of these two years, we have three lovely vacation homes and four comfortable glamping tents to show for our work. However, we still need to promote the place, bring it under public attention. This is the challenge for us right now.

    We can’t afford to hire professionals to film, write and share about us. Thus, we decided to do things differently and offer an exchange of services: a stay in one of our vacation homes for a set of photographs and/or films of Dolina Village and the surroundings.

    During the past weekend we had the pleasure to welcome the first videographers, Robert and Iasmina, a young couple from Arad. Making video materials is both a profession and hobby for the two, who love travelling in search of new stories for their Youtube channel. They enjoyed a relaxing weekend at Casa Batrana and took the time to make videos with both a drone and the camera. The result is a set of great images of winter in Zece Hotare. We are really happy with this outcome and want to take this opportunity to thank Robert and Iasmina for their work.

    For the future, we hope to welcome more content creators (amateurs or professionals) to enjoy some time at Dolina Village in exchange for what they do best: photographs, videos, articles etc. Should you be interested in a collaboration, let us know at info@dolinavillage.com.

    Weaving branches, an old school method of building fences

    weaving branches into a fence

    When living in the country, there are always things to do around the house and property. We are always busy with new projects, the latest being trying out a woven fence at Casa Marie-Jose, one of our guesthouses.

    We were very excited to build this fence, since we had no idea whether we would be able to do it and what would it look like in the end. Spoiler alert: it turned out great!

    The making of this fence took us about two days, and the most work was done by two people. The first step was sourcing the wood out of our small patch of forest. We needed to thin out the forest, since the former owners did not manage it properly and it ended up looking like a bunch of sticks, rather than trees. We selected the smaller trees for both the poles and branches for weaving, and left enough small trees for the forest to start regenerating.

    thinning out the forest

    Once the materials were home, we were ready to start. All cutting and shaping of the poles and branches was done using a handsaw and an axe. After fixing the poles into the ground, we could start the actual weaving. This was fun and not very difficult. The fence matches the style and feel of the house, and gives the guests there more private space to relax, work or eat.

    Woven fence half way done.

    Since we concluded that this trial fence was a success, we will build more of them at Dolina Village in the near future. If you like to see the fences in real live, You will find us in Zece Hotare, Comuna Şuncuiuş, Bihor, Romania

    Sunny day sleigh ride!

    The spontaneous sleigh – ride

    What do people do in the countryside during winters, you might ask. Well, they ride a horse drawn sleigh with their neighbours!

    No, of course we don’t do that every day, but when we do, it’s a moment of pure joy and excitement; and yes…we are grown-ups. Yesterday was one of these days; the sun was up, the air was chilly and the snow well set. We were enjoying a hot cup of coffee, while looking out the window when the phone rang. It was Marius, our neighbour and one of the last people in Zece Hotare who owns a horse and sleigh.  It’s a perfect day for a sleigh ride, he reckoned and oh, did we agree! 

    One hour later, we were all dressed up and sitting on the sleigh. There was room for us and our guests at Casa Bătrână, the first of our vacation homes, here in Zece Hotare. Dinu, the horse, did his very best to show us a good time and gave us a tour of the surrounding hamlets belonging to the village of Șuncuiuș. For us, this was the first ride in years, but for our guests, it was the first ride ever!

    So, if you’re up for a sleigh-ride, keep an eye on the weather report for Șuncuiuș, Bihor and book your winter stay at Dolina Village.

    The happy, new year, discount

    Dear friends and guests, we, here at Dolina Village, wish you a Happy and Healthy New Year!

    Along with our best wishes, we bring you a special offer for the first two months of the year: a 10% discount on all direct bookings of two nights and a 15% discount on all direct bookings of 3 nights of more. These discounts can’t be combined with our midweek & full week discounts and are not applied to bookings via external platforms.

    We hope you enjoyed the winter holidays with the ones closed to you, but we know, this season can be exhausting! So, if you are looking for a place to get away from it all, Dollina Village is the place to be. Our vacation homes are well hidden behind the forest surrounding Suncuius, far from busy roads and noisy cities. This is the place to be if you need to disconnect, relax and sleep undisturbed.  A plus point of the winter months: Zece Hotare is even more beautiful with a full pack of snow!

    Oferta de Anul Nou

    Dragi prieteni si oaspeti, echipa Dolina Village va ureaza un An Nou bun, cu sanatate si chef de plimbari!

    Pe langa cele mai bune urari, va aducem si o oferta speciala pentru rezervarile din lunile ianuarie si februarie: 10% reducere la orice rezervare de doua zile si 15% la orice rezervare de trei sau mai multe zile. Reducerile nu se pot combina cu ofertele existente de midweek sau full week si nu se aplica rezervarilor facute prin platforme externe.

    Speram ca v-ati bucurat de sarbatorile ce tocmai au trecut, alaturi de familie si prieteni. Da, stim ca aceasta perioada poate fi foarte aglomerata si obositoare.

    Dolina Village este locul perfect pentru cei ce cauta sa scape de alomeratie. Cele trei case de vacanta sunt bine ascunse de padurile ce imprejmuiesc satul Suncuius, departe de drumuri circulate si orase zgomotoase. Zece Hotare este locul perfect unde te poti deconecta, relaxa si dormi linistit, inconjurat de peisaje faine, cu putin noroc, acoperite de zapada.

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