Blogs from Bulgaria, Europe - page 63

The train from Belgrade to Sophia did appear as scheduled this time, and after the rough night before we paid the $10 upgrade to sleeper. It was well worth doing. I had an almost uninterupted nights sleep, and felt good when I arrived in Sophia. First impressions of Bulgaria. 1 - Friendly people - for the most part, a guy helped us get the sleeper carriage, a Bulgarian. 2 - Great coffee - again a real cafe society. 3 - Great Ice Cream - the best Sara has ever eaten in her life :) 4 - Magnificent churches - hope the photos show this well. 5 - Watch out for pickpockets! - more later.   On arrival in Sophia we got talking with Hyun from South Korea on his way to Istanbul with 10 hours in ... read more

Last run of the day, fading light, a quick joint and then drop into untouched snow between dark green trees. Powder fizzes as your board cuts over it, and we were riding fast, snaking tight, blind corners through trees. Fizz- Turn - Swoosh - Cut - my stomach was up in my throat, gripped in concentration as me and Oli raced down the dense forest. Oli shot off to the left, i took a right hand swerve around a clump of trees. As I carved fast, i came up against a wall of tree trunks - Instantly my brain calculated i could not stop in time... CRACK! A moment of freeze-frame, the taste of blood in my mouth and i sank into snow up to my shoulders. Then silence. Then came the pain, deep in my ... read more

(part1 - ) The map arrived on a cold, dark, wet London morning in January. The map was a glowing ray of adventure and mystery on a cold, dark, wet London morning. An Adventure that would see me facing death in a cold, dark, snowy paradise. Bulgaria - March 1997 They say that a journey of a thousand miles starts with one small step, but that's not true - a journey starts long before a shoe is tied, before a bag is packed or a ticket booked. Travel starts in your head. When an idea grabs you and you know that you must go. When your everyday routine screams boredom at you and a cold, wet morning feels like a commute though a graveyard of dreams. When a map like that turns up, you know that ... read more

Has anyone been to Bulgaria? Well, our traveling group didn't cover much ground in Bulgaria but what I remember about this trip is how well we started it. Coming from more than a week's travel around Greece, we drove from Thessalonika towards Bulgaria. Our introduction to Bulgaria was a visit to the impressive, awesome Rila Monastery. The pictures do not do justice to the lovely sights of Rila Monastery. Do please remember that I was then still using a non-digital camera. Just point and shoot, no reviews permitted. If one gets a double exposure, tough luck. The Monastery of St. John of Rila I am not into antiquities. I am not even a collector of anything. I never formed any attachment to material things and a piece of art for me, is really something best preserved ... read more

Saturday was an all-day trip to Rila Monastery in the Rila Mountains. On the way was a stop a the town of Dupnitsa, then known as Stanke Dimitrov. The town had been renamed in 1949 for Stanke Dimitrov (1889-1944), an early Bulgarian Communist leader. Turkish tobacco had been introduced to Bulgaria during the period of Ottoman rule. (Tobacco had been introduced to Turkey by the Spanish, who imported it from the Americas. The Ottomans subsequently developed their own means of cultivation.) In 1975, Dupnitsa was the center of the Bulgarian tobacco growing industry. In the Cold War era, the Bulgarian tobacco industry was huge. Bulgaria was then the world's leading exporter of cigarettes and supplied the USSR and the Eastern Bloc countries with their tobacco products. Evidence of this major industry could be seen by the ... read more