A quick tour of Bulgaria

Wednesday 5th June Rila Monastery

After an early breakfast we took the bikes off the van and set off for the Monastery.  It was downhill all the way so it was lovely to 'free cycle' down although always in Jacqui's mind that she had to manage the uphill climb back. We arrived at the Monastery shortly after 9am.  It was lovely to be there so early before the crowds arrived spoiling its very tranquil feel. This was added to by the beautiful mountain back drop and the exquisite bird song. We wandered around the courtyard looking at the external buildings: refectory, accommodation areas etc before entering the highly decorated and ornate church. We then climbed Hrelyo's Tower, the sole remaining building from the 14C. It was with some difficulty we tried to see the frescos as you could not enter the final floor but had to peer through windows but it was worth paying the 5Lev to see the views.
We left the confines of the thick monastery walls and walked down beside a tumbling mountain stream that met the River Rilska.  We crossed two precarious rotten wooden bridges safely and made our way to the ossary and cemetery. There was not much to see here so we retrieved our bikes and then began the uphill cycle to the van - it wasn't too bad.
It was now nearly midday so I made some sandwiches for later on and we had a coffee before setting off.  Mike realised that our loo was still leaking despite the repair so that took a bit of time to clear up and we reverted to our own former 'loo solution' that involved the ever wonderful duck tape.

We were now ready to set off for Plovdiv. Without a sat nav, only a small scale map, no understanding of Cyrillic alphabet and very few signs on English it was going to be a difficult journey to Plovdiv (Bulgaria's second city). We stayed on the main roads and had lunch a few km from Dupinitsa with the mountains of the Rila National Park in the background.
The journey was beautiful, taking us high into the ski resort area of Borovets.  We got lost in Kostenec but eventually found the road to Plovdiv. We drove through the town looking for somewhere to stay. There were no official campsites so we ended up wild camping by the River and awaited to see how 'illegal' it was.

Thursday 6th June
No police knocked on our door last night so we decided wild camping was not so illegal after all. We spent the morning exploring Plovdiv old town. Jacqui's mistake that morning was to wear her sandals. The streets of the old town are made up with large irregular cobbles that were difficult to walk on and her back soon started aching badly.


 One of the attractions of the historic centre are the number of 19th Century National Revival houses. These were timber-framed houses with beautiful interiors, many with ornate wooden ceilings.  Plovdiv also accommodated the Romans and the Roman Theatre was still in very good condition. Mike was also excited to see that the Roman remains that went under the existing shopping streets were also accessible for viewing. Plovdiv was a very pleasant town and well worth visiting.


Back at the van we set off for Hisarya but it was with some difficulty that we found the right road. Our first attempt took us to a village where the road just ended in a dirt track and we were forced to retrace our steps of 10Km or so back to Plovdiv. However we did find the right road and by mid afternoon we were in the pretty Roman spa town of Hisarya. All the Roman remains were set in a lovely green park which contained 22  gushing mineral springs. Mike queued up with the many locals to fill up our water bottles and we were surprised to find that the water was quite hot! As Jacqui's back was aching badly she went to lie down whilst Mike had a quick tour of the park. Once completed we set off again in the direction of Sofia (written as COØИЯ - you see Jacqui's problem as chief navigator) and headed for our next planned stop at Koprivshtitsa (we are not spelling that in Cyrillics for you).



Koprivshtitsa turned out to be a lovely mountain village, full of half-timbered houses. It was set in a valley with gorgeous woods all around. When we stopped the bird song was beautiful and plentiful. There do appear to be a lot of birds in Bulgaria.  This village was a key participant in the April Uprising of 1876 when the Bulgarian rebels fought against the Turks and there were many references to this throughout the village e.g the Bridge of the First Shot'. There were also six house museums.



We paid 5Lv (£2.50) for a combined ticket but only managed to see two. The first was Oslekov House. This had a front facade depicting some Italian scenes and was supported by three ancient cedar pillars. Inside the rooms were heavily decorated with wood with intricately carved ceilings. Each room had long fitted benches that ran along the rooms perimeter. These were covered with local woven cloths and made the rooms look quite bright.


The second house we visited was the birth place of Todar Kableshkov, leader of the local rebels. It was an interesting and beautiful village to wander around.  We returned to the van for supper and then went out for a drink. We ended up at a non-alcoholic cafe where Jacqui had mint tea and Mike had hot chocolate.

. We felt a bit obvious in the village at our current parking spot so decided to move out for the night. We found a small clearing in the woods off the road into the village about 5km from the centre and parked up there for the night. it was a very peaceful place and we slept well.

Friday 7th June Sofia
We were up and away early and after two hours driving we had arrived in Sofia and it was still only 9am. Jacqui stopped to buy some cherries which are in abundance here and cost about £1 a kilo and then we hunted for somewhere to park. We found the tourist information centre who were helpful about sights and maps but said "no parking". We eventually ended up at a shopping mall about 5k away where we could park free for four hours. We then took a taxi back into the Capital to maximise our time (7 lev) and then did the guided walking tour unguided. Impressive buildings were the Alexsandar Nevsky Cathedral, the beautiful Russian Church (gold with emerald spires).




The Rotunda of St George is the oldest church (4th Century) and contains frescos from the 8th Century. We walked down to Largo where there is a Nelson Column type monument. previously it had held a statue of Lenin but this has now been replaced by the Goddess of Wisdom.

Walking back through the park we stopped for ice creams in front of the decorated National Theatre building.
We had now received a text from Gary (the husband of Louise who was renting Mike's home and who worked in Sofia) stating that we should be able to park by the cathedral in the evening. We checked it out and confirmed that after 7.30pm there was free parking there. Sorted! We took the taxi back to the shopping mall and collected Buster.

At 7.30pm we met Gary and went off for a nice meal. Gary assured us that we would be safe in the van at our current spot so we stayed in front of the parliament buildings over looking the cathedral and wondered in how many  capital cities this would be possible.

Saturday 8th June
Our plan today was to visit Veliko Tarnovo. We chose to go via the Trojan Pass which took us up into and over the Balkan mountains and through the Balkan National Park. Again we had lovely views despite a bit of mist and rain. It was a long drive and got quite hot. We did a quick tour of Veliko Tarnovo but were too tired to do any proper exploring. We stopped briefly to get some information and were nearly towed away - parking is carefully monitored here as we had only stopped for 5 minutes when the tow truck arrived. We had found a campsite to stay in just outside of VT. It was run by a British couple Nick and Nicky. Their campsite was difficult to find, partly due to Bulgarian rules about no signs being allowed if the site is more than 300m from a main road. But it was worth finding as it was a little oasis. It had a lovely swimming pool and all other facilities were very good. We caught up on our washing and planned our visit of VT for tomorrow.





Sunday 9th June
We were in VT by 9.30 am as we wanted to explore this place before heading off for Romania. The town is set on a high gorge above the River Yantra. The main sight is the medieval fortress. This looked very impressive from a distance but was more disappointing inside although it did give wonderful views of the town.


  From there we walked through the Old Quarter which was full of Craftsmen shops and down to Sargina House. This was a rich Merchant's house and it had an interesting interior as well as information about the local history and culture but we did not feel that it was as nice as those we saw in Kopravshtitsa.  We left at 1.00pm and headed for the border town of Ruse and had lunch above the River Danube that marks the border between Bulgaria and Romania.


Getting into Romania was done with little formality. Our passports were again given a cursory glance and we had to pay 2 euros to get over the bridge (we had spent the last of our Bulgarian currency on fuel)
. On the other side it was more difficult to a) find a cash machine and b) sort out what documents were required for the compulsory road tax.  Jacqui did achieve this but got very hot in the process.  Our Sat Nav was still not picking up routes but at least we had got rid of the Cyrillic alphabet and could read the road signs.

The road to Bucharest was straight and of good quality.  We were meeting Jacqui's sister and brother in law here later on. The City centre was busy and our first task was to find Cathy and Martin's hotel. They would be arriving in the early hours of the morning. We found the hotel with only a little trouble which had a good central position for exploring the city. it had been our intention to camp outside of the city at Casa Alba but the hotel staff were so friendly and accommodating that we ended up parking and camping outside. We had a beer there, texted Cathy to say we were here and that all looked good and went to bed.