Scărişoara Cave

Scărişoara Cave (Romanian: "Peştera Scărişoara") is one of the biggest ice caves in the Romanian part of Carpathians, more specifically in the Apuseni Mountains.

The exact date when the cave was discovered is unknown, but is mentioned in 1863 by the German Adolf Schmidl, who made some observations and the first map.
Emil Racoviţă mentioned this cave and how it was born in his work "Speleology", which appeared in 1927.According to the scientist Emil Pop, the ice cave was born 3500 years ago, during the glaciations, when these mountains were covered by snow and ice.

The cave is located at an altitude of 1165 metres above sea level. The cave is 105 m deep and 720 m long, the entrance shaft (50 m in diameter and 48 m in depth) giving access through metal stairs to a large chamber, (108 m long, 78 m wide) - "The Big Hall". From this point three openings lead to "The Church" (in front, with over 100 stalagmites), "Great Reservation", "Coman Gallery" (left) and "Little Reservation" (right). The part that tourists can visit includes the entrance shaft, "The Big Hall" and "The Church", the other chambers being reserved for scientists (and can be visited only with the agreement of the Speological Institute of Cluj-Napoca.The glacier has a volume of 75000 cubic metres and it is 26 m high. The temperature is up to +1°C in the summer and down to -7°C in the winter. In the part for tourists the average temperature is around 0°C.

Bats live in the ice cave, as do small bugs (2-3 mm long) called "Pholeuon prozerpinae glaciale". In the "Big Reservation" a Rupicapra skeleton was discovered.

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