Libearty Bear Sanctuary, Romania

 The Libearty Bear Sanctuary in Romania is the largest sanctuary for brown bears in Europe. It is located at Zarnesti, which is outside Brasov in Transylvania. "Libearty" is currently home to over 130 bears, and is recognized as the most ethical sanctuary in the world, spread over an area of 70 hectares of oak forest.

There are 2 tours a day in English, where visitors walk round with a guide to see and learn about the bears. Visitors have to pay to use a camera, phones are free. I decided to get a camera ticket, even though I knew the bars of the fences would get in the way of photos.  

The sanctuary was established in 2005. It was created in memory of the bear Maya and is today the home of over 100 bears, all rescued from a cruel and abusive life of captivity. Most of the bears were rescued from captivity, confined in small cages, miserable, just for fun for restaurants, hotels, factories, gas stations, circuses or even monasteries. They are now in their natural environment. Before seeing the bears you watch a short video about where some of the bears have come from, which is very sad to watch. 

Seeing the first bear was exciting

As we walked on further, we came to a large open area which is used as a feeding station and there is a pond. The bears were being fed with fruit whilst we were there.

Two bears were having fun in the pond -

A male bear -

There is a webcam which shows one of the ponds.