http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Europe , Bulgaria , North , Veliko Tarnovo en-us Mon, 06 Oct 2008 15:52:29 BST Mon, 06 Oct 2008 15:52:29 BST As I've got time and everyone raved about this place I decided to do a mini detour to Veliko Tarnovo in North Central Bulgaria so I joined Sarah from Sofia and we headed up on the afternoon train on Friday thinking 2 days would be enough. I'm currently up to my 4th night and have to tear myself away as this is a great little place which seems to trap you into the 'just one more day' syndrome.Veli http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-329089.html I kind of hopped in and out of Bulgaria on my way to and from Romania. I spent 3 days in Sophia just playing tourist then I headed up to Romania for a week. On my way to Istanbul I made a stop in Vielko Tarnovo. Vielko Tarnovo is one of those places you hear through the grape vine and when you get there you end up falling in love. It's such a beautifull city and there was so much to see. Ever http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-295951.html Veliko Turnovo is an beautiful little slice of central Bulgaria. It's a town of about 80000 and relatively touristy but it really doesn't feel that way. It's actually also the original capital of Bulgaria from the first independence from the Ottomans to the relocation of the capital to Sofia in the 20th Century.Wednesday May 14thUp early to get out of Sofia this morning as I hoofed it to t http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-277921.html Well this was an interesting few days...We left Plovdiv intending to head to Macedonia via Sofia as there is no direct bus. Which meant getting up at 4.30 to get to the bus station to make the early bus so we could connect early in Sofia which we did. And we quietly congratulated ourselves on making the connections with no issues and having things go so smoothly. Just before the Macedonian b http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-275002.html With bags packed we headed down to breakfast. It again consisted of dry bread and stopping Darko from hitting food from our hands. After forcing as much down as possible free is free after all macs adhorned we went to try the bus station yet again.We encountered much the same problem as the day before no one in the ticket office for the Istanbul buses. Fortunately our luck changed and someone w http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-215860.html Anne and I are back from our trip to Bulgaria. In fact we have been back for a while now and as some of you know I have been somewhat lax in updating the Blog. Bulgaria is a great country and I would highly recommend anyone passing by to stop for a while. Ideally you should 'stop by' via aircraft. Under all circumstances avoid our route across the TurkeyBulgaria border. Whether by train or b http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-215660.html With our heater on we were tricked into feeling warm and cozy in our room when outside it was actually cold and very wet. The thought of breakfast lured us out of bed and down into the common room. We did stop for a while to look out from the balcony onto the general sceney which was hidden in the dark last night. Breakfast was pretty poor but was made 100 better by Darko the hostel cat. He alte http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-213799.html After a late night we were looking forward to a late breakfast and an easy departure from Bucharest. Instead we were woken up at 830 by the worst thing one can get woken up by young American girls. They didn't extend the courtesy of creeping around as we had the night before. Quite happily they dressed spoke and giggled without a care given to the two of us sleeping or not sleeping. This was http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-213797.html Jenny here hi guysFinally made it into Bulgaria after extremely long detour to get across the border from romania which resulted in us doing 65 90 and 85 miles on three successive daysOnly been in Bulgaria 4 days and already had a coulpe of epics On saturday when we crossed the bridge into Bulgaria it was 7pm and we had already done 80 miles. Ian punctured crossing the bridge and by the ti http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-205827.html Next day had to catch the bus to Veliko Tarnovo...walked around the old town in the morning. The rain is heading to this region...gtlt ahhhh.I loved Plovdiv though....wish I had spent more time thereAnyways took the bus and arrived at V.T.arrived at this bus station in the middle of nowhere it wasnt on the map so lost..thank god for the first time the payphone and the number http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-188493.html We crossed the border from Turkey to Bulgaria on foot and in a cloud of mosquitos. Very exciting despite having a blood sucker stuck to every bit of visible skin. The border guards were fairly surprised to see us weaving our way through the long line of articulated lorries but let us through anyway and all was well until we realised that we were in Bulgaria in the dark without a map and nowhere n http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-168450.html Svita na lepsie casynbspEurope raquonbspBulgaria raquonbspVeliko Tarnovo By BystruskaApril 11th 2007Takze zopar optimistickych pohladov na Pleven . http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-147684.html S odstupom par dni musim uznat ze napriek akokolvek 'jedinecnym' zazitkom som si uz stihla vybudovat k Plevenu isty citovy vztah. No vazne . Myslim ze k tomu prispel hlavne Risov prichod od ktoreho vlastne vsetok cas travim v praci a tak moznosti zazit dalsie BG prekvapenia sa minimalizovali Doniesla som si svoje vlastne uteraky zehlicku a prestala som chodit na hotelove ranajky http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-147674.html Riso Kedze situacia je taka ze sa Ti sem mozno az tak nechce necham opat hovorit za seba moje dnesne zazitky potom co som mala na izbe otvorene celu noc okno podarilo sa mi zbavit sa puchu na izbe Ak si budes davat veci do skrine co asi hej lebo ine priestory na skladovanie tam moc nie su nechaj si vzdy apson jedny dvierka skrine otvorene nech do nej prudi vzduch ...inak budes vyc http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-145178.html Zdrasti zopar postrehov z Plevenu BG na ktore sa casom budem pozerat hadam s usmevom vy mozno uz aj teraz Day 1 Ze uz prvy den je zjavne ze Pleven je unikatne miesto ze kde su taxiky este lacnejsie ako v Sofii ze kde ta na izbe 4 hotela privita vo dverach letiaca mola ze v ktorom hoteli nenastukas ine ako bulharske kanaly v TV a tak prepadnes manii bulharskej superstaaar http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-145166.html The last few days have been so charged with life it's been incredible.Our vague travelling three Val Kinsey and I easily turned into a four as we made plans at our turkish host's place. It seems Cem also had little better to do than hang out with Americans and the lack of a Bulgarian visa and threat of a night in a cell was but a small obsticle.The four of us piled into the overnight train lo http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-98383.html I left Sofia for a few days to wait until i could get my Visa for romania and went to Veliko Tarnovo.. when i arrived there there was a group of 9 aussies and 1 kiwi.. all had just come from Turkey After anzac day.. soon as i got there iwnet and got some Vodka and juice with Paris and all the guys played a drinkin game. once we were all blind we went out to some bars and clubs then each staggered http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-87573.html Hello everyoneThe highlight of my travels through Bulgaria was at the town of Veliko Tarnovo.It goes way back and has a huge fortress. Visiting during the day was okay but at 930 most evenings they have a light and sound show. The music was specially written and covers the history of Bulgaria. The entire structurecathedral walls gates are lit up with lights coordinated with the music. I http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-85397.html i just wanted to let everyone know that today i had what i'd like to call a language seizure that happened as a result of my speaking catalan spanish english french and bulgarian all within a 2 minute period. i literally started shaking and sweating. in other news i bought a cell phone yesterday but as of now there aren't any minutes on it so i have to go buy a voucher. i'm keeping it in b http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-82137.html so basically i'm having the most amazing time of my life and i never want to leave...bulgaria has turned us americans into alcoholics and chain smokers so i don't think i'll be able to elaborate much on our fun times in this blog lol. but just so you know we're all totally in love with this place and don't want to leave anytime soon. luckily it hasn't even been one week yet. yesterday i had thi http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-80106.html so yea this entry will be pretty short but i'll do a brief summary of things. so saturday night kasia and i met up with colin who was back in sofia. we went out for ice cream and then had a rather amusing experience going to a kebab stand where like 8 really ugly bulgarian drag queens were eating. sunday morning we pretty much chilled and packed and before i knew it kasia was headed for home. http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-79236.html I think I managed to get sick of Music in Vel305ka Tarnovo. Don't worry it's not a permanent illness But a few days I just wanted silence. The problem was that the hikers hostel where I was staying although lovely deemed 305t reasonable to play mind numb305ng trance music from early morning to early evening. From then it got even worse as a couple of obnoxious australians whose majo http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-79162.html I was not a true Bulgarian until I reached Veliko Tarnavo and developed a taste for the fine 'Rakia' grapa... until now I was not much of a fan but together with my fine Swiss company... it was a whole new experience. Since returning to my grandparents' home I cannot get used to my grandfather hiding the Rakia from me... he's not used to his grand daughter asking for seconds and thirds.... but http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-78554.html So I'm in Veliko Turnovo Bulgaria now. It's about 10.45. And we just had dinner a little while ago. Before that we walked around the massive fortcitadel structure here. That was really beautiful. There was a strange churchcathedral at the very top which had no crucifix nor an altar nor any seats at all. It was just paintingsand not regular church paintings. They were almost communistic in http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-77542.html mmk well i'm in sofia now and seeing that this computer is Windows 98 i'm getting a bad feeling....consequently i'm just going to update wo pictures and hope i can find a computer from this century in the near future...also i'm pretending i'm in veliko turnovo still...so our last day in istanbul consisted of us basically sitting and eating for 75 of the time we had . we sat on the water again http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-77540.html Yesterday we'd got the Balkan Express BucharestIstanbul we got off midway at Veliko Tarnovo. And we thought we'll just catch this train tomorrow. It'll all be fine. What we didn't realise..till too late was that we had caught the LAST TRAIN to Istanbul for a Month The lines needed repairs..so they'd just cancelled the trains ARGGGGHHHH...major stressor as we thought we'd have to go to So http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-76566.html After a funfilled day in Bucharesti with Liam we decided to spend the morning looking around the Gardens in Northern Bucharest. It was welcome relief from the heat. We had a big of a chaotic journey trying to get to the train station Mainly because we had large rucksacks and Romanians got very angry with our large rucksacks.. and probably said a great many rude things to us in RomanianFound http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-76564.html OK it wasn't at anyone and it's not the first pass on this journey I've made so fare but this one the Troyan Pass separating the Sredna Gora mountain range and the Balkan range I managed without pushing my bike. Yay The RilaPirin and Rhodope mountains in particular had left me slightly jaded and traumatised because I'd spent a considerable time pushing instead of riding and so thought tha http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-65123.html Dobre Den everyone......Greetings from sunny BulgariaWe drove from the Carpathian mountains back to Bucharest where we boarded a train for the 2 hour run to Constanta......which actually took 5 hours. The ship was ready. Cabins are really large and the public rooms very nice. Dinners have been wnderful so far and are served with lunch and breakfast being buffet style. Today we rode by bus http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-63202.html Leaving Romania sadly haha laboured point by now im sure Joel myself and the pet that followed us to the train station Farah from the hostel in Bucharest catch the train to Veliko Tarnova in Bulgaria. On the train we met Justin and Cris two newlywed Americans who are gong the same way and got booted out of their cabin further up the train. The pimp of a conductor tells us we need to pay http://www.travelblog.org//Europe/Bulgaria/North/Veliko-Tarnovo/blog-60440.html