…and Away We Go!

We arrived by bus yesterday and took a cab ride into town from the dusty bus station on the outskirts. We are staying in the Hotel Gurko with a great view of the Yantra River and an unusual monument located on an island connected to the town by a bridge.

We have a small apartment with a balcony – it’s in a traditional timber and stone building and there is cozy tavern downstairs.

The tavern at the hotel serves hearty meals like roasted pork knuckle, Bulgarian meatloaf and grilled trout.  The food is tasty and red Bulgarian wines are very good.

It’s early spring here and flowers are in bloom.  We admired these!

Today the Free City Tour was canceled so we made our own tour following a map from the Tourist Office.  We walked around the grounds of the Tsarevets Fortress and toured the church at the top of the hill.

Rather than traditional icons the walls of the church were painted with contemporary murals.

We walked down the street selling local crafts.  This guy’s manner seemed a little “wooden” at first but he was nice once I got to know him. 😊

We finished our tour before the rain…now it’s sunny again.  We have one more day here before we make some complicated transportation connections on our way to Bucharest, Romania.

The Free City Tours have been excellent.  Today Ilya led around the city on a two-hour tour.  He did an great job of sprinkling in interesting historical facts at each stop along the way.

The tour began in front of one of the many city parks which you can see in the background in the photo above.  We learned that Plovdiv is considered to be one of the longest continually inhabited cities in the world.  It’s between 6000-8000 years old!

The historical timeline is complicated.  It was settled by the Thracians because the surrounding hills made it easy to defend, the river provided fertile soil for growing crops (like the Nile River in Egypt), and the climate is moderate.  It was captured by Philip II of Macedonia, taken over by the Romans, and destroyed by the Huns.  And that’s just the early history…

We made a stop in the Old Town where we saw a couple of guys enjoying  coffee and conversation.

There is a bit of graffiti around town,

but for the most part, Plovdiv is very clean and tidy.  Today in the parks, workers are removing the spring pansies and planting summer flowers.  We are impressed by all of the beautiful green spaces with monuments, flowers, and many trees.

The main streets are lined with shops selling clothing, souvenirs, jewelry and more.  The photo below is of the inside of the Orange Bookshop – a Bulgarian chain.

We expected the food in Bulgaria to be heavy with meats and potatoes but we have had some beautifully prepared and delicious meals at half the cost of a comparable meal at home.  We’ve had duck, pastas, lamb, seafood and very creative salads.  The salad below is from Hemingways in Plovdiv – it has fresh greens, tomatoes, strawberries and glazed-with-honey goat cheese.

The desserts are delicious too!  We had a funny misunderstanding when a waiter described a special Rosemary Cheesecake.  We thought that sounded really unique and ordered a slice.  When it arrived it was dark pink in color and we realized that the waiter confused the word rosemary with the word raspberry.  It was a slice of raspberry cheesecake with a chocolate crust.  Still tasty but a surprise.

As we expected, Bulgaria is full of surprises!

It’s a special day here in Bulgaria!  May 1 is a holiday and also LARRY’s birthday!  We’ve had a whacky sort of day but all is well and we’re looking forward to a nice dinner to celebrate!  🎂🎉💃🥂

We left the hotel this morning in search of laundry services.  We followed Google’s directions walking for 20 minutes to find that the laundromat had moved.  We retraced our steps, followed Google,again, and found the new location of Mr. Jeff’s Laundry Services.  If all goes well, we should have our clothes by noon tomorrow.🤞

Our next task was to go to the Bus Station to buy tickets to Veliko Tarnovo for our trip on Wednesday.   As it sometimes happens, we got on a bus going the wrong direction.  We rode to the end of the line, realized our mistake and got on the next bus going in the right direction.  An hour later, we arrived!

We we’re able to check out the schedule and learned that we can only buy tickets on the bus the day of travel.  We found the departure point (Cektop 2 – Veliko Tarnovo is first on the list) so we’ll know where to be at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday.

We caught the city bus back into town.  The guy on the right is the “Ticket Seller”.  Each bus has someone onboard to collect the fare.  It costs 1 Lev (fifty cents) for a ride.

There are Roman Ruins all over this city!  Kids use them as a playground and we used this one as a pathway to get to the gelato stand.

Some very kind people helped us out today and we’re grateful!

The weather is changeable – sunny, rainy, and then sunny again!  In spite of that, people are out today enjoying lunch and drinks at the outdoor cafes.

We left Sofia by bus yesterday, arrived after about 2.5 hours and checked into the centrally-located Villa Flavia.  It’s very nice.  Our room is large, the breakfast very good and it’s reasonably-priced.

Today we walked to the Ancient Roman Theater.  We were very careful not to tumble down the marble steps as there are very few hand rails.  The theater was constructed in the 1st Century AD.  It can hold between 5000 and 7000 spectators and during the summer they host plays and musical performances there.

Larry brought along his drone to get a birds-eye view but unfortunately, a nice security guard told him that he couldn’t launch from inside the theater.  He told Larry that he could fly from outside the theater grounds but Larry decided not to do so.  Below the yellow circle shows the drone during its brief flight.

There are many street food options around town – gelato, shawarma, and pizza-by-the-slice, but the most unique snack is a cup of sweet corn with butter on top!  It’s very popular!

We can see the minaret on the mosque at the end of our street!  It’s a good landmark in a city of twisty, turning streets.

We have a couple more days to explore Plovdiv before we move on to our next stop – Veliko Tarnovo.

We spent our last full day in Sofia wandering around town catching up on  things we might have missed.  We returned to the impressive         Athena-esque Sofia Monument.  It was erected in 2000 and stands in a spot where there was once a statue of Lenin.

Sofia’s crown is a symbol of power, the laurel wreath she is holding symbolizes fame, and the owl symbolizes wisdom.  The statue has been  controversial as some think that it’s too risqué, but it’s quite an impressive image!

Last night we went to the Sofia Opera House to see a performance of Puccini’s Madame Butterfly.

The set was colorful and the theater nearly full.   Sofia has a long history of opera performance, though the National Opera House is a fairly modern addition, built in 1947. For this performance, the role of Madame Butterfly was performed by Italian Donata D’Annunzio Lombardi and most of the rest of the cast members were Bulgarian.  We enjoyed the experience!

We’ve had a good stay in Sofia – it’s an up and coming city!  There is quite a bit of construction around town and we think in another year or two, it will be even better.  There is a great outdoor cafe scene but its still early spring here so it was too chilly for us to enjoy it.  We had some difficulty with the language and noticed that there are many smokers.  In fact, Bulgaria has the highest smoking rate among European countries.  All in all, we’re glad we came!

We’ve packed up and will soon take a taxi to the bus station for our next stop – Plovdiv.  The trip by bus takes about 2 hours.  We’re looking forward to exploring a new destination in Bulgaria!

Today we visited a unique museum called The Red Flat.   The museum is designed to allow visitors to go back in time to Communist Bulgaria of the 1980’s. By visiting the apartment home of an average family we learned what everyday life was like for ordinary Bulgarians during the Cold War. We listened to a series of 46 short stories on a headset while we wandered from room to room, looked at family photos, opened closets and drawers, and imagined what life must have been like for this family of husband, wife, and son.

We spent about 2 hours here learning about the Petrovi family.

The National Art Gallery was less interesting but we enjoyed a quick look at the Icon Painting at the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral.

Dinner at the Crazy Diamond Restaurant was a treat.  The flavors were unique and delicious; and the setting in an old house was fun and funky.

Our walk back to the hotel took us past the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral on the highest  point in Sofia.  In the daytime, we can see snow covered mountains in the distance.  There is a major construction project in front of the Cathedral so it be more photogenic once the project is completed.

So, we’re finding Sofia to be an interesting city to visit.  It’s still cold and chilly but spring flowers are in bloom so warmer weather is surely on the way!

Today we did something that we rarely do when we travel…we took a two-hour long city walking tour!

Typically we start our day in a new-to-us city with a good map and a hope that we’ll discover the highlights on our own.  We found that reading a map and following street signs in Bulgarian makes getting around  a daunting task.  We stopped in an English-language bookstore and a kind store manager Rado, pointed out “must see” stops, answered our questions, and suggested the Free Walking Tour as the way to go.  We’re grateful for the excellent suggestion.  Kris was a good guide, stopping at important points through this city with a long and complicated history.  The tour was an excellent way to become acquainted with Sofia.  We met people from Australia, Canada, Germany, England, Hong Kong, and a young woman from the Ukraine who is living in Istanbul.

The weather is breezy and chilly – spring is just getting underway here!

We have a lot more to learn, museums to visit, and places to discover in this city.  It’s a bit gritty around the edges but fascinating and we hope that two more days here will give us a better understanding.

Happily, everything went according to plan and we landed in Sofia right on time at 2:00 p.m. Bulgarian time (7:00 a.m. in Atlanta). We had an early morning layover in Paris with plenty of time for a walk, Wordle, a chocolate croissant, and coffee.

The temps in Sofia are chilly and the skies grey with rain off and on.

Here’s how travel writer Vinicius Costa describes this city:  “In Sofia, the capital and largest city, tourists will find an improbable combination of Roman ruins and Communist-era Brutalism, numerous cafes oozing with character, a lively nightlife, and the country’s best museums and art galleries.”

This evening, we’re staying close to our base at Eurostars Sofia City Hotel – we’re resting up, anxious to begin exploring this city tomorrow!  We’ll be here for 3 more days.

We’ve heard great things about travel in these countries and we’re excited to experience this part of the world. A couple of days before we were  scheduled to leave, we found that our flight from Paris to Sofia had been canceled.  It took some heroic scrambling and persistence on Larry’s part but eventually we had a new flight to replace the canceled one.  We’re flying Delta to Paris and then, Bulgarian Air from Paris to Sofia.  If all goes well we should be in Sofia by Tuesday morning April 25, Atlanta time.  We plan to spend time in both Bulgaria and Romania.

Itinerary:

The cities we hope to visit are:

• Sofia, Bulgaria
• Plovdiv, Bulgaria
• Veliko Tarovo, Bulgaria
• Sibiu, Romania
• Cluj Napoca, Romania (not shown on the  map below)
• Brasov, Romania
• Bucharest, Romania

These destinations are all new to us and we expect a lot of surprises.  The weather looks chilly and perhaps rainy but there will be are interesting sights to see, foods to try, and people to meet.

Transportation:

We’ll use a combination of train, bus, and rental car to get around.  We know that at times, the travel will be slow-going and we have some complicated connections to make but it all adds to the adventure.

Language:

The official language of Bulgaria is Bulgarian.

As an example, this is the address for our hotel in Sofia:

ул. „Стара планина“ 6, 1000 София център, София

We’ve printed it out so that we can give it to the taxi driver when we catch a taxi from the airport in Sofia to our hotel in the city center.  Hopefully, we can use Google Translate to communicate when we need it.

The official language of Romania is Romanian but the closest Romance language to Romanian is Italian.  Maybe we’ll be able to understand some Romanian since I’ve been studying Italian and Larry is great with languages and understands some Italian.

Currency:

Neither Bulgaria or Romania are in the European Union.  Each country has its own currency.

Bulgaria uses the Lev.

Romania uses the Leu.

Food:

It looks hearty and delicious.  We’ll post photos along the way.

So, adventure awaits!   If you’re following along, we’ll post every couple of days if the Internet is strong.

We had some technical difficulties and some of the photos from our previous posts have disappeared but we will be working to restore them.

Best Wishes!

Sharon and Larry