Moldovan Toltry: Fetesti

What do we call our little Moldovan Switzerland? The Fetesti landscape reserve in Edinet district, of course. It is famous for its toltry limestone ridges, in whose grottoes and caves primitive man once settled. They are unique geological formations. 20-10 million years ago a foothill depression developed on this territory, filled first by the waters of the Tortonian and then of the Sarmatian sea. Only a small part of the reserve lies on level ground; most of it spreads across the sheer, steep slopes of the toltry ridges that frame the valley of the Drabiste stream. The landscape's distinguishing feature is its rocks: yellow, grey, grey-green, brown with rusty, almost red patches. They were decorated by lichens, which are called sphinx plants because they are formed from two different plant organisms — single-celled green or bluish algae and colourless fungal threads.

Some slopes of the Fetesti gorge resemble lunar craters. However, they became like that as a result of human intervention. The «lunar craters» are an almost worked-out limestone quarry.