Blogs from South, Bulgaria, Europe

We had a great time in Plovdiv and our apartment their was great. We left Plovdiv at 8am heading for Dimitrovgrad some 75kms away. Today we were basically on main roads all day. While there was a constant stream of traffic going past, it was consistent. It meant a couple of things. First we weren't able to just amble along chatting amongst oursleves stopping as we wished at the drop of a hat to take a photo and second it meant that we rode in close formation for the whole of the day. This made the ride quicker, but definitely not quite as relaxed as normal. The scenery changed a bit during the day. We saw a lot of open fields that are starting to brown up a bit. A big contrast from the lush green ... read more

Thursday 5 October The rasping sound of a tongue licking our campervan was what woke us up this morning. All around us was the tinkling of bells and loud 'moo' sounds. When we looked out the window, there was a herd of cows ambling past! Last night we had arrived after dark, and wondered where on earth the coordinates given to us by Vasco would lead us! The roads in Bulgaria are not very well maintained and tend to be full of potholes. Passing through one village, daddy didn't see the speed bump (which had no marking), and the campervan gave an almighty jump, with everything going flying! Toward the end of the drive, we took a dirt road that seemed to lead into the middle of nowhere! Indeed, when we awoke we were surrounded by ... read more

Tuesday 17th July 2012 After a quick breakfast we made our way down to the bus station just down the road and caught the 0900 bus to Burgas. The bus was almost empty when we left but as we travelled along Sunny Beach we picked up many passengers including some young tourists from Britain. They had just spent a fortnight there, staying at one of the parent's holiday apartments. Just a quick flight for them, be like us going to Bali. About an hour later we stopped in Burgas and using our trusty iPad map we easily found the Fors Hotel, our home for the next couple of nights. Nice enough room, nothing flash but it was large and clean. Here we left our luggage and went off exploring. The hotel is near the city mall ... read more

Hi, We are now in Sandanski, about 25km from the Greek border. Tomorrow we will cross the border and arrive to Thessaloniki. The big question now is if to do it by train or by bus, anyhow, it is about 3 hours. Since Greece should be much more expensive then Bulgaria (that what we have heard...), at least we found a coach in Thessaloniki for 2 nights. On our route west, however, in the Greek Macedonia, in towns such as Edessa and Kastoria (each has population of about 20k) there are very few couches to select from (maybe 4 in each) so finding one would be almost impossible, I guess. Shame, this is going to be expensive...also in Bulgaria, BTW, in towns having similiar population, we could not find any. On the other hand, our CS ... read more

Tag 17 bis 24, 5.250 km von Galway Rumaenien! Wir waren kaum ueber die Grenze gefahren, da merkten wir schon: Das Land hat was! Ein Eindruck, der sich spaeter bestaetigen sollte! Unser erster Stop sollte in Transilvanien, genau genommen in Sighisoara sein (der Deutsche Name fuer die Stadt ist Schaessburg, aber dazu spaeter mehr). Auf dem Weg fuhren wir durch unzaehlige Doerfchen, wo ueberall schwer was los war. Je weiter wir ins Landesinnere fuhren, desto mehr. Bald sah man mehr Pferdefuhrwerke als Autos. Und wenn Autos, dann meistens ziemlich alte. Trabis, Ladas, Dacias sowieso. Wir fuehlten uns, als haetten wir eine Zeitreise gemacht. Waehrend Ungarn total flach ist und ziemlich zivilisert wirkt, ist Rumaenien total anders. Huegelig, ein bisschen chaotisch und irgenwie wirkt es hier nicht mehr so richtig "europaeisch". Anders als ueberall bisher war vor ... read more