About Us: a Local Danube Delta Team Since 2004
Guided tours, birding and photography in the Danube Delta and Dobrogea, run by a team based in Tulcea.
Our story
We don’t sell tours. We share the place we chose to live in.
Since 2004, our local guides have taken travellers through one of the last wild places in Europe, the Danube Delta. Not in a hurry and not ticking boxes: on open boats, at the pace of the place, through channels and lakes most visitors never see.
It started as something personal. In 2004 our founder, Iliuta Goean, left Bucharest and moved to Tulcea. Not for a job, but because the Danube Delta had taken hold of him. That decision shaped everything that followed: the guides we chose, the boats we built and the way we plan every trip.
The Danube Delta does not fit in a highlight reel. It shows itself slowly, to those who take the time. After more than twenty years on these waters, our work is still the same: to give you that time, with someone beside you who knows what you are looking at.
Milestones
Twenty years on the water
- First guided toursOur first trips in the Danube Delta, under the name FotoDelta, from Tulcea.2004
- Our own open boatsBoats built for wildlife and quiet travel, and a new name: Discover Danube Delta.2011
- Our first guidesSpecialised guides join the team, and the team keeps growing.2012
- A professional associationOur founder sets up AGPDD, the Association of Professional Guides of the Danube Delta, and becomes its first president.2014
At a glance
- Based inTulcea, Romania, since 2004
- Where we guideThe Danube Delta and Dobrogea, plus photo tours in Bulgaria, Transylvania and at Lake Kerkini, Greece
- BoatsOur own open boats, at most 10 guests each, 8 on birding and photo tours
- Boarding pointPort Tulcea Aval, Intrarea Marmurei 3, Tulcea
- Licensed tour operatorAlternative Travel, operated by SC Dobrogea Misterioasă SRL
VAT RO23526340 · J36/151/2008
What we believe
Seeing a place is not the same as living it
A boat racing through the Danube Delta shows you water and reeds. A slow open boat, with a guide who knows the whole Danube Delta, shows you the quiet channels away from the traffic, the silence just before sunrise and the birds exactly where they should be seen.
Open boats, the complete experience
No roof and no plastic walls between you and the Danube Delta. You see, hear and smell everything around you, and the boat stops whenever something is worth it. It usually is.
Educated, passionate guides
Most of our guides studied biology or ecology, spent long years with the Romanian Ornithological Society and took part in international wildlife monitoring projects. What drives them is a passion for nature, birds and the Danube Delta. They guide in English.
Knowing where not to go
Conservation shapes every route. We never enter nesting areas and we never push a bird to fly for a photo. Knowing where not to go matters as much as knowing where to go.
How we work
Small groups, slow boats, a plan that follows nature
Small groups
At most 10 guests on a boat, and at most 8 on birding and photo tours. Everyone has space, a clear view and time with the guide.
On the water every day
Even between tours we are out on the water, for wildlife monitoring, filming and photography, in every season. We see what changes from one day to the next and know what is worth seeing right now.
Three kinds of trips
Nature tours for curious travellers, birding tours for birders, photo tours for photographers. The same open boats, but different programs and different hours. Choose the one that matches you.
Our team
The people behind every trip
The largest team of guides in the Danube Delta, with a travel coordinator and a programmer behind them. We are on the water all year, and so are our colleagues who live in Mila 23. When one of us finds something interesting, the whole team knows about it within minutes.
For professionals
Film crews, photographers, tour operators
We organise logistics, permits and guides for film crews, for photographers with their own projects and for tour operators who want the Danube Delta and Dobrogea done well.
Travel with us