Moldova with kids: An honest guide

We have two toddlers and live in Chișinău. In our free time, here’s what we do.

When I pick up my three- and six-year-olds from their kindergarten, we usually head straight to the park. It’s nicer to process their after-school meltdown in the fresh air and me holding a takeaway almond latte.

The park Valea Morilor is where my Moldovan man took me on our first walk to impress me. He didn’t think it through. It was February and depressing. But more than eight years later, after heavy renovations and flower planting, all my foreign visitors with kids come here for a stroll by the lake. In the summertime, this is the coolest place to be. This is the Times Square of Chișinău. Except that instead of the flashy screens, there are plants and sand.

If you enter the park from the Telecentru district, you’ll see playgrounds and an old-school outdoor gym, which is a big hit among toddlers. Who cares about slides and swings if you have an old rusty metal pole to grab onto? The smallest kids compete for the bravest to climb to the top of the ladder while parents beg them to stop. Their hands will smell like coins for hours afterward.

On the plus side, the public restroom attendant is nearby and lets kids in for free (but gets judgmental if you forget to greet her demonstratively).

The tricky part is keeping the kids away from the bouncy castles someone has set up next to the playground as a side hustle. Even if I find cash for this overpriced half-an-hour fun, my kids get bored after ten minutes, and I have to spend the next twenty asking them to stay inside the giant inflated bag—and they better enjoy it.

When we feel more adventurous, we head to Rose Valley Park. From Melestiu Street, you can quickly see the skate park and the kids’ favourite attraction—a multilayered climbing frame where kids run up and down like hamsters. Such a simple but genius entertainment that could be Moldova’s trademark invention!

One of our kids’ favourites is the attraction resembling a giant hamster cage in Rose Valley Park in Chișinău.

There are tandem swings and a playground for the tiniest humans. We sometimes walk up the lake in the middle of the park and hop on a car-shaped water bike. Exploring this tiny body of water takes five minutes, but then your kids can start chasing down other bikers. Without their knowledge, of course. Don’t worry, life vests are provided.

Longer trips out of the city

If we can, we usually leave the capital on the weekends. Sometimes, it just means renting a simple Airbnb house in nature (hello, an eco-village in Rîșcova). In the villages, we sometimes knock on locals’ gates and ask if we can buy their produce. The kids would climb on tractors and taste the apples from the garden.

Or we would drive to a vineyard. Lately, many of them have built playgrounds. I guess they figured out that people have kids? North of Chisinau, in Crama Mircești, ask the locals about the old self-made potter who only makes black bowls and plates. The vineyard gave him the deal of his lifetime and ordered their table set from him. He happily opens his doors to visitors and talks about his adventurous life.

In the east, by the border with Ukraine, lies a village, Lalova. Near the river, a Moldovan family built a traditional bed-and-breakfast, Hanul Lui Hanganu, where we sometimes like to take time off. The owner built most of the houses there by himself. It’s a quiet place (I mean, quiet before we arrive) with a playground and a swimming pool.

A stroll in Lalova during an April sunset.

Of course, a major argument for my three-year-old is the simple swing, on which she spends hours. Which means that I spend hours there, too. Other highlights include idling horses and cats.

When Orhei Vechi in Butuceni village has outdoor concerts or other events, we stay the night at Eco Resort Butuceni, especially during the spring berry season. My kids can spend the whole morning eating berries, and I can sneak into a hammock to read a book. Or we can dip into the pool. But since there aren’t any pool floats for the kids, and I always forget them at home, this option is less relaxing.

When we have guests, we sometimes take the ferry to the other side of the river Nistru. It’s free, and you can take your car from one village, Molovata, to another, Molovata Nouă, with it.

My six-year-old contemplating life decisions by the Nistru River in Molovata Nouă.

You do have to pass a young teenage guy with a Russian flag sewn on his uniform, but officially, it’s Moldovan territory, so there’s nothing to worry about. We would go to a hotel, Vila Dorului, that has a heated pool. Last year, we went swimming there in late October.

Or, the kids can splash in the river. Or, eat the cherries if it’s the season. You can find wild grapes in the pine forest there. On our way back, a heavy storm prevented the ferry from crossing. So we waited at the bus stop, singing and looking at the branches falling. It was as eventful as a theme park.

(The ferry did leave eventually, if you wondered if we were still stuck at that bus stop).

Moldova may not have famous wellness centres (such as Therme in Bucharest, Romania) or marked, child-friendly hiking tracks. Moldova’s best-known theme park may be the miniature Kozy village filled with goats. And the only beaches are bits of sand by the Valea Morilor lake or the river Nistru.

But if the goal is to spend time with family, then you really don’t need more than a few trees, a fun picnic blanket (which I bring everywhere) and lots of snacks. And that usually makes the day for our toddlers.

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