Light Flow

Lights on the River Somes / Szamos in Cluj / Kolozsvar, taken from the bridge near Hotel Napoca. Hot off the camera, shot less than an hour ago.

Many of the stories of my childhood are related to this river. It may be small compared to other rivers, but for me, it used to be *the* river, which I grew up with. It used to be clean enough for bathing, swimming, rafting on used bus inner tyres, or sending the dog in to retrieve the ball or the twig, playing fetch. :)

Of course, we did that above the city, (up the river on the west city exit) where there were no sewers or city garbage, and the water was clean. We've also fished in it when we were kids, and happily fried the poor 5-10 inch fishies at home. Caught some larger ones too, but just a very few, I could count them. Today it's still more or less clean, but I wouldn't bath or fish in it anymore. Modern times are taking their toll, and pollution is much higher than it used to be, back in the golden days of my early youth.

On the upper course the Little Somes (Somesu Mic) consists of the Warm Somes (Somesu Cald) and the Cold Somes (Somesu rece) afluents, with the confluence point at Gilau. Both upper rivers originate from the pitoresque carstic plateaus of the Western Carpathians, also called Apuseni Mountains.

There's a chain or reservoir lakes on these upper course rivers. Most of the drinking water of the city comes from there, especially from Lake Gilau. Hydroenergetic turbines generate green electrical power along this upriver chain of reservoir lakes. These are also a very nice place for hiking, especially in the summertime. I've got very nice memories of a whole summer spent on lake Tarnita, a 7km long dam lake, from back when I was 19. Kayaking, fishing, swimming, camping, beers, hitch hiking, cooking great pots of meal on an open fire, and frying fish in aluminium foil in the hot ash are just a short list of what's been done there.