Băile Borșa

Băile Borșa, formerly called Baia Borșa (Hungarian Borsabánya, "Borșa mine", German Pfefferfeld), is a component locality of the town of Borșa, in the eastern Maramureș Depression, enclosed by the Rodna and Maramureș mountains, in the Vișeu valley near the Prislop Pass. It became part of the town of Borșa in 1968, when the town was created by Law no. 2/1968. At the 2021 census it had 2,907 inhabitants. The settlement grew up around mining. Mines for complex and copper ores operated in the area at Gura Băii, Colbu, Dealul Negru, Burloaia, Dealul Bucății, Cornu Nedeii, Măgura and Toroiaga-Emerik. In 2019 the mausoleum of a family of Austrian origin, which opened the mines in the nineteenth century, was found in the local cemetery. The Roman Catholic church of St Francis of Assisi was built in 1925, the parish dating from 1806; in front of it stands a small monument to the soldiers who fell at Băile Borșa between 1914 and 1944. Băile Borșa is a seasonal spa and climatic resort of local interest at 850 m, with a cold, humid subalpine climate, a mean annual temperature of 7 °C and about 900-1,000 mm of precipitation a year. Some 20 mineral springs rise in the Țâșla valley, among them the Baritina, La Ciuroi, Izvorul din Groată (Alexandru gallery) and Colbu springs. The waters are carbonated, iron-rich, bicarbonate, calcium- and magnesium-bearing and non-thermal, and are used in drinking cures for digestive, kidney and urinary complaints and in baths for disorders of the locomotor system. A marked trail leads from Băile Borșa to Fântâna Stanchii and the village of Șesuri, while the Borșa Tourist Complex, with its ski slopes and the approach to Cascada Cailor, lies further south at the foot of the Rodna Mountains.