Step by step, through heaven. The place that became “the most beautiful wedding gift in the Mures Valley”

You only need a few moments to break away from the noise of the world and step, as if through an enchanted portal, into the realm where the colors and scents are in full spring recital. Even the imposing former mansion adds a special charm to the place with its white face furrowed by the wrinkles of time.

Here, at Simeria Dendrological Park, everything is a story: “The park and Bela Fay Castle belonged to a long line of Hungarian noble families and, over the years, they brought many exotic plants to Simeria. As a curiosity, with each generation, the park is passed down as a wedding gift and changes its name, the owners having only daughters.

Several owners appear from here – Gyulay, Kuún, Fáy, the last owner being the Ocskay family. One of the family members, Susana, even worked in the Forestry Research Institute and actively participated in the inventory of the collection in the Arboretum and in its development”, says Daniel Pitar, head of the Simeria Arboretum section.

The old mansion now houses the offices, but also a valuable collection of research, seeds, while the back terrace protects some superb specimens of palm trees. From here, among the Tuscan columns, as if from a new stage, the view opens to the spectacle of nature: the bamboos that always tickle an invasion of territory, purple Japanese maples, delicate and shy magnolias, hedges with tamed green crests or monumental tree species , which seem to support the sky itself.

Closer, a cat circles a small cedar with bright green leaves splashed with golden yellow. At the root of the mansion, a wave of bergenia raises its vividly flowered heads. From the corner of the house, the tamarix bursts into spectacular pink cascades.

In addition to the classic places to walk, each season brings colorful stars to the park. For example, spring is known for the shrubs that bloom richly and variously such as yew or kerria japonica with its yellow flowers such as dandelions, or golden rain, lilac, honeysuckle, lemons, aromatic jasmines, thorny-leaved mahonia, English laurel with its candles the clumps, the heather with its “snowballs” or for the bursts of color of the Japanese quince.

The surprise of the year came from … peonies: “Even though it’s still April, some peonies have started blooming since the middle of the month!

It seems that this year the flowers in the arboretum do not respect the traditional rules: we now have magnolias, lilacs, peonies, tulips and the park is a splendor of colors and fragrance”, exclaims Daniel Pitar.

It looks like spring like never before! The unnatural alternation of temperatures has upset nature as well. Specialists from the Dendrological Park in Simeria say that until now they do not know of such a wave of flowering in different species.

On the alleys cut in special shades of green, the dirt paths slowly lead you to the places where the magnolias hold on their long arms thousands of ballerinas in white or pink, purple or yellow dresses. Their dances provoked by the breeze or the enthusiastic chorus of blackbirds and other skilled voices make you stop for minutes in front of the spring show. Shy buds, fragile cups or bridal bursts make the large petals unique presentations of forest ornaments.

It’s an excellent year for magnolias that have burst into bloom. The spring suite slowly leads you to the small lake guarded by two giant sycamore brothers. Here, in the silence of the years, a magnolia grew freely. She doesn’t look like a butler, nor is she towering, but her arms are somehow reminiscent of the convoluted dance of giant snakes in tropical forests: “It’s a special example of the lazy Magnolia solangiana, with pink flowers on the back and white flowers on the face.

It has some flowers that, when fully opened, are almost 30 centimeters long”, explains the forester, looking excitedly at his favorite magnolia: “We don’t want magnolias that grow straight, fast or bloom quickly, we want trees that develop beautifully , at their own pace, to have a unique appearance. This is nature’s show!”

The walk through this place takes you along the alleys where spring bursts colorfully in thousands of proud tulip heads, among which a few daisies have made their way. Elsewhere, wisteria vines with large, purple, fragrant clusters have conquered the trees and climbed their rough bark walls hundreds of feet above the ground.

Spring in the Simeria Arboretum should not be missed: another reason is the celebration that broke out at the beginning of the month in another magnolia: “It’s a Magnolia solangiana, and this year we have the strongest flowering in the last ten years: every crimson, every lujer bears at least a few flowers.

The magnolias looked like snowy trees this spring”, says Daniel Pitar. At the lake near the spring, the fish swam freely among the fallen petals on the water’s sheen. Small white boats crossed the pond for days in a row in search of the mother branch…

With every walk, you enjoy the tranquility of the place respected by visitors. There are many who come here every week to enjoy hours away from the hustle and bustle of life, others who are surprised by meeting this corner of heaven for the first time.

For everyone, the park employees have made small places to relax: small tables, benches or swings, all carved from the wood that fell over the winter in the protected area.

Everything was recycled and turned into useful objects. New informative plaques prompt you to learn more about famous or rare species in the park. There are bilingual plates, in Romanian and English, but the QR codes also provide information to Hungarian and German speakers.

The employees of the Dendrological Park not only take care of the health and beauty of the flowers and trees acclimatized here from all over the world, but also of cleanliness or comfort and good information of the visitors. Because the spring symphony begins in a less known place: the greenhouses.

Here, the humid and warm air is perfect for the maternity of seeds or the lavish collection of cacti, explains Daniel Pitar: “In the greenhouses at the park, the story of all the trees and shrubs begins. Following the international exchange of seeds, we receive and transmit free of charge to other botanical gardens, seeds. They are cataloged and planted in pots, then moved outdoors and, when they are a suitable size, a place will be found for them in the Simeria Arboretum.” Here you can find ornamental nettles or oxalis, the lovely red clover, geraniums with aromatic leaves or a few vanilla plants.

In addition to the renowned dendrological collection spread over 70 hectares, flowering shrubs, ponds with water lilies and fish, clear springs and several pairs of wild ducks, here display their beauty and aromatic elder, cherry trees and a lavish Hisakura, an ornamental cherry with fistfuls of pink flowers.

The park of Simeria is associated with magnolias due to the multitude of specimens and species acclimatized here, which bloom one after the other, from March to the end of May, when the tulip tree takes over. Spring here, however, presents a much more varied show, with millions of petals, winged voices, a puppy eager to play and even a brightly colored parrot that arouses the cat’s desire to hunt.

The current dendrological reserve was the park of an impressive mansion, where the owners built a splendid place, after bringing and acclimatizing here species from all continents. “We have a documentary attestation from the year 1763, when the document already mentions the existence of alleys lined with chestnut trees, then in 1860 it appears that the first specimen of acacia was introduced here. Since then, many events have passed over the Simeria park.

One of the nobles who owned the castle, Béla Fáy, was a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and passionate about botany and dendrology. In a 300-year history, about 2,300 different species of trees and shrubs have been acclimatized in the Simeria Arboretum”, says the current head of the Simeria Arboretum, a department under the National Forestry Research and Development Institute in Bucharest. The employees here are preparing an exhibition of cacti that will delight the public in 2025.

“The oldest dendrological park on the face of the Romanian earth is the one in Simeria, established in the middle of the 18th century, in a natural forest in the Lunca Mureşului, where, gradually, all kinds of European and non-European trees were planted. (…)

It includes descendants of the oldest acacia in the country, brought from France and planted here, in the second half of the 18th century, as shown by a manuscript from 1860. Here you can also see remarkable elm specimens, reaching record sizes : 120 centimeters in diameter and 32 meters in height. Among the American trees, the Californian cypress, the Canadian maple, the large catalpa, the Virginia juniper, and the Canadian vine are worth mentioning. Also in this park there is a magnolia with huge leaves and flowers as well, “like a sycamore”, wrote the historian Constantin C. Giurescu, in “The History of the Romanian Forest from the Ancient Times to Today”.

The incursion through the history of the place brings you the names of the owners, but also of the specialists who made sure that this place did not disappear under the great plans of the communists. Radu Stelian and Corina Coandă contained a lot of information in the volume “Arboretum Simeria. Monograph”.

The arrangement would belong to some well-known landscapers of the time, but the documents were destroyed and the names were lost. In the first half of the 19th century, the estate’s residence, now declared a historical monument, was built in neoclassical style with Tuscan columns. In September 1923, the park is visited by King Ferdinand with his entourage, and the chroniclers record how the king, a passionate botanist, declared himself delighted with the species in the park.

Susana Ocskay mentions: “The park was created at the beginning of the 18th century by arranging the existing natural meadows in the Mureş meadow, as a recreational forest. The forest was maintained, probably only the extraction of trees was practiced, and the clearings were preserved, used as natural hay. The first exotic species were introduced around the middle of the 18th century”.

At that time, from the springs to the center of the park, huge chestnut trees shaded an alley, and acacias bloomed on the terrace and on the banks of the Strei canal. Simeria Dendrological Park can be the most romantic place on earth, with alleys along which you can let yourself be pampered by the most beautiful silence, always appropriately colored and aromatic, always sung by crickets and birdsong.

Laura OANA – text and photos