Bicaz

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Bicaz is a town in Neamţ County, Romania situated in the eastern Carpathian Mountains near the confluence of the Bicaz and Bistriţa Rivers and near Lake Bicaz, an artificial lake formed by a dam on the Bistriţa. Bicaz used to be a border town, and accommodated a customs office on the Hungarian-Romanian border until 1918.

Before the construction of the Bicaz Dam and the cement plant (1950s), Bicaz was just a small mountain village where the main economic activity was wood processing. By tradition, the tree trunks were linked together, forming a raft (pluta); a raftman (Romanian: plutaş) used to drive the raft on the Bistriţa river downstream to wood processing facilities in Piatra Neamţ.

The town is a point of departure toward the Mount Ceahlău and Bicaz Canyon (in Romanian: Cheile Bicazului), two important touristic destinations in Romania. The ski resort Durău is also located nearby.

Economy

Beside the tourism, Bicaz is the site of one of the biggest cement plants in Romania, Carpat Cement owned today by the German company HeidelbergCement. The town has also a few timber factories and wood processing facilities.

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