Ciucaș Peak from Muntele Roșu

From the gravel parking area at Cabana Muntele Roșu (1,280 m), reached by paved road off DN1A near Cheia, a yellow-band trail follows the Berii stream up through spruce forest, crossing the water at a forest-road junction before climbing past the stone-capped Fântâna Nicolae Ioan spring, the last reliable water source on the route. Above the spring the path leaves the streambed and switchbacks steeply up the valley wall, gaining most of its elevation on a series of tight forest-road hairpins before breaking out of the trees near Cabana Vf. Ciucaș (1,595 m), an alpine hut set in a high meadow below the summit cone. From the hut the trail turns to red-stripe waymarks and climbs the last, steepest stretch through the Babele la Sfat, a pair of weathered conglomerate megaliths that give the final approach its name, before a short rock scramble onto the summit block itself. On top, weathered grey conglomerate boulders frame a genuinely wide panorama: the jagged limestone crest of Piatra Craiului stands out to the west, the forested Baiu (Gârbova) ridges roll away to the west-southwest while the Postăvaru ridge rises northwest toward the Bârsa depression and Brașov, and to the south-southwest the roofs of Cheia and the switchbacks of DN1A sit far below at the foot of the mountain. The whole upper mountain lies within the Ciucaș Natura 2000 protected site, and because the conglomerate bedrock is too porous to hold groundwater, there are no further springs above Fântâna Nicolae Ioan, so hikers carry all the water they need for the upper half of the climb.