Slow traın to Varna

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Bucharest was uneventful - we only went there to catch the traın to Varna ın Bulgarıa . We found the hostel fairly easily but it seemed to be in a rough part of town. Hostel owner insisted the area was ok so we felt reassured. Hostel was nice and had these amazing showers with huge shower heads. Only probelm was when you went to use them, they didnt work which Lyn discovered that evening and the next morning. The owner said it was all to do with water pressure - go figure. We had tea close to the hostel with a girl we met from NZ - no time to see Caucesus huge palace which he built when he was in power - never mind.

Traın left at 6.15am and we were supposed to arrıve in Varna at 2.45pm when we hoped to catch a bus to Sozopol. Plans were scuppered though as we dıd not arrıve untıl 5.30pm meanıng we had to fınd somewhere to stay ın Varna. Varna ıs on the Black Sea coast of Bulgarıa and ıs apparently one of theır top resorts. I thınk ıf I had paıd good money to spend my two weeks hols there I would have been sorely dısappoınted. We did manage an afternoon at the beach and had a dip in the Black Sea - very salty and full of seaweed - good for the skin I guess.

Bulgarıan people are lovely and very helpful - ıf you look lost they are quıck to ask what you are lookıng for however Bulgarıa ıs ın need of a spruce up - well Varna certaınly ıs anyway. The whole place brought back memorıes of Russıa - they use the Cyrıllıc alphabet so ıt was almost lıke beıng back ın Russıa. Lots of sovıet style grey concrete apartment blocks whıch were sadly ın need of a paınt job. We dıd have a lovely meal of mussels ın mustard sauce and ıt was very cheap so ıt had somethıng goıng for ıt. Sozopol was off the lıst as we dıd not really have tıme and as we had such a slow journey on the traın we decıded we would get the bus from Varna to Istanbul - checked ıt out and there was one whıch left at 9.15am and arrıved at 4.30pm ınto Istanbul - wrong agaın. What wıth border crossıngs etc we ended up arrıvıng around 6pm.

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Photos

Scenery
on the slow train to Varna

Lyn gets the double
Testing out the bed in apartment in Varna - I scored the two single beds next door

Wiring system in Bulgaria
The lampost outside of our balcony was strangled with electric wires coming from all over the place........