Barajul Gura Râului

The Gura Râului Dam is located on the Cibin River, in Sibiu County. It was built between 1971 and 1979 and has a height of 73.5 meters, being the second highest dam with buttresses in Romania.

In the preliminary stages of the design, the option of an anchorage dam was also considered, but the final solution was a concrete dam with mushroom buttresses. This type of dam is more resistant to seismic action and has a longer lifespan.

The dam consists of 22 platforms, each with a height of 15 meters. The abutments are 4.5 to 8 meters wide and the base of the dam is 61.2 meters wide.

The beautiful town of Gura Râului is found at the exit of Cibin from the mountains, at a distance of 18 km from Sibiu, according to its suggestive name.

Documentarily attested since 1476, this settlement currently boasts a rich cultural tradition, being the place where George Coșbuc composed Zamfira's Wedding, Mihail Eminescu traveled to collect ballads, and Lucian Blaga identified characteristic mioritic spaces here (Bocca Del Rio).

Gura Râului, also known for its choir that won numerous competitions, hosts an important ethnographic museum, organized in a beautiful peasant house, where numerous exhibits are living testimonies of the ethnographic wealth of the region.

Located in a picturesque mountain area, the village attracts attention through the tradition of popular technical installations, whose ingenious constructions arouse admiration. Famous are the plows operated by hydraulic wheels, used in the past for splitting wood, their number reaching several dozen in the previous period.

Source: Sibiu and surroundings (Ministry of Tourism, 1979)