Stories of Crișan

It really felt nice being only three in the boat. There was enough space to feel comfortable so the ride from the city of Tulcea went smooth all the way to Crișan.

The heart of the Danube Delta. That’s what they call this village. Together with Mila 23, these is the “fishermen haven”. Or so they say...

The village of Crișan is set on the Sulina branch of the Delta... the middle one. It somehow lives up to its name of “the middle one” as the most used sign you will get when you will ask the skippers to slow down on the smaller canals, is the middle finger. The density of damn peasants here is bigger than the legal one but fuck it, it’s full of morons. Somehow this spectacular place is drawing bastards here, more than decent folks.

Loud motherfuckers too, ruining the peace and quiet of the beautiful mornings around here. They scream, they ruin the atmosphere and the environment, throwing garbage in the water saying that it’s “bio degradable”. It’s not!

 

Being late September, mornings and evenings are foggy. The water is warm and is developing this fine mist that is making the wings of the mosquitos heavy. Weather is still fine and hot during the day so the damn vampires are still lurking and in search of blood. The mist is somehow protective and mesmerizing. 300 meters over the big Sulina canal and you can’t see the other shore, that’s how thick this think is. In the rays of the morning Sun you can even see the small water particles floating in the air and getting this “steam” formed.

In contrast with the place I’ve been to two weeks ago, Sulina and the villages it harbors (and the City of Sulina) is very crowded. “Very crowded” for a place in the Delta, because this wilderness is too friendly when it comes to living here. Though the summers are nice, winter hits with power around here up to the point where water may freeze. People here are always stacking up with things they can’t normally find here (like medicine) as they don’t know what kind of winter they will have. If the water freezes then they will not be able to reach the closest mainland city: Tulcea. There should be Governmental ships breaking the eyes but the only one Romania still posseses is harbored in the city of Galați and is so old that it can’t do the job properly anymore.

We are only men here, friends celebrating the bachelor party of one of us. Not mine, don’t worry about it. Though the place we stay is pretty luxurious the preffered place to drink and speak during evening-nights, is the dock. Over the water there is nothing but wilderness and everynight, around 10 o’clock, wild dogs start howling. At first we thought that there are people cheeri g and partying but then we listened more closely and we understood that no bloody soul would party over the water, in the middle of a fucking swamp.

I know what you’re thinking. Why eould any bachelor party happen in the middle of the Delta? And I don’t have a better answer to that than “maybe everybody is a great fisherman”. Nope. It’s not the case. I’m one of the few here that know how to be in charge of a fishing line and while I don’t fish, I have to compose lures and remake broken lines because nobody else is doing it.

Haven’t seen the face of many fish up untill now but perseveration is the mother of succes, or something like this. Especially when we’ve let a 5 kilo cat fish escape yesterday right after I took it out of the water.

Working with amateurs is one of the main drawbacks when it comes to fishing and keeping the rigurosity of this craft. Not everybody is gifted with the needed patience for this so this time I’ll have to endure being the “fishing mule” of the group.

I only hope I don’t snap like a frickin’ fishing line...

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