Week 10: Bulgaria Here We Come

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Soon enough it was time for us all to get on the road again - Carrie & Debbie back to the UK, and Jen & I had decided that we needed to get back to the sea, but this time it was the Black Sea we decided to head for - Bulgaria, to be exact. So, back to Ljubljana, to prepare for a 25hr, 4 country train journey across the Balkans. To be fair, the journey itself wasn’t that bad - the train from Slovenia, through Croatia and Serbia, was very modern, but the border crossings were a bit of a pain (the sooner they all join the EU, the better). I got a few funny looks from a couple of the border police (my passport is 9.5 years old!) and one guy even got out a magnifying glass to check the photo (I think he was looking for hair), but we did better than some of the other backpackers on the train - they were told to get off the train at the border crossing into Serbia due to not having the required visa, and had to go back to Zagreb to sort it out - not what you need.

We changed trains in Belgrade, and the less said about that city the better - knowing now what we do about the wars in the Balkans, it is clear to see what the cost of the Serbian atrocities and defeat has been (foreign investment, tourism, etc) - it has also been many years since I’ve seen shanty towns, and even then it was in India, but they are plentiful along the train lines in Serbia - a sad sight for Europe in the 21st century.

But, onwards, ever onwards, and we arrived into Sofia, capital of Bulgaria, on another lovely sunny morning, and got to our hostel, where we were staying for 4 days before heading for the coast, and possibly some sailing (if a local magazine was to be believed). So we got showered, and went out to start exploring Sofia - we were immediately struck by the absolute state of the place, from the Pavements of Death (it’s difficult to look at the sights when you can’t take your eyes of the open manhole covers on the street), to the absolutely total lack of interesting sights, architecture, etc, and we started to see the 4 days stretching in front of us. But, Sofia has a charm that only starts to reveal itself once you get into the swing of things, and it became evident after a couple of days that if you look past the lack of municipal pride or maintenance, that there is a really vibrant young city thriving away, plenty of shops, cafes, bars, etc, and by the time we had to leave on the Friday, we were a little sorry we had been so damning about it initially. You just have to hunt out the few interesting sights (Ministry of Emergency Situations anyone?), and learn how to translate the Cyrillic alphabet into English (virtually no signs in English), and survive the Death Race 3000 that is Bulgarian driving, and survive the pavements of death, and the taxi drivers who want to rip you off, and the crumbling Communist monuments, and the strange service in restaurants (don’t worry about starters, mains, etc - it all arrives when its ready, in no particular order), and book markets who want 10 euros for awful 30 year old books, but once you get past all that, Sofia has a charm all its own.

And you will also see some photos of our visit to Rila, a Christian Orthodox Monastery outside Sofia - the decoration and devotion evident in it was incredible, and obviously maintained with daily care - worth the using up of 6 lives on the drive there and back...

And then it was time for us to pack up again and get a bus to Sunny Beach, a resort on the Black Sea, where we are going to look for some sailing opportunities (there is apparently a marina full of yachts there), and stay in a v cheap apartment while we do so...more to follow...

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