Underground

Targu Ocna is a small city situated in the northeastern part of Romania and its population is about 11.000 only. However, the city is famous with its salt mine. The salt exploitation goes back until the 14th century, the times when salt was inevitably important for food preserving. This mine has several kilometres long galleries and it’s still active but in some part of it, an underground Sanitarium was constructed and it was in use between 1974 and 2005. In 1992 in the middle of the salt massif, a touristic centre was built, lying 240 meters deep and covering 13.000 square meters area. A place that offers optimum conditions for relaxation and sports. Being naturally quite cold as an underground facility, you can reach it after a 3 kms long organized bus trip. Most of the visitors are local Romanians. Families enjoy with their children, have picnics, play cards, practice variety kind of sports in a unique environment. You can drink your coffee or beer in its cafeteria. You can see people running and driving their human-powered carts. All takes place under a huge salt massif that has been exploited for ages.