Delta Dunării

History

The Danube splits into three main channels before reaching the Black Sea — Chilia, Sulina, and Sfântu Gheorghe — and over roughly 10,000 years their sediment has built up a delta of reed marsh, floating islands, and shallow lakes that continues to grow outward into the sea today. UNESCO recognized it as a Biosphere Reserve, protecting Europe's largest remaining natural wetland and one of the most biodiverse regions on the continent: more than 5,500 species of plants and animals, including over 300 bird species, with the delta hosting more than half the world's red-breasted geese population, a majority of Europe's pygmy cormorants, and its largest colonies of white pelicans. Villages like Sfântu Gheorghe, at the mouth of the delta's southern arm, are reachable only by boat, and life there still runs on fishing much as it has for generations. Most visitors explore by boat, gliding between channels too narrow and shallow for anything larger.