Bulgaria - Bansko

We had a couple of short flights and landed in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, an hour or so before dark. We picked up our car from a lovely guy at the airport. He put the wind up us about parking though. He told us to never park anywhere unless it says we can. Not only do you get fined, but the number plates are removed from your car! 

Much to our surprise, the car was brand new. We don't like new cars - any scratches have to be ours, lol. We couldn't get a sim card at the airport which we needed for google maps to get us the 2.25 hour drive to our first destination so we had to rely on maps.me. Surprisingly, it was actually pretty good. 

We headed out of the airport and were thrown into a modern world. We drove through Sofia. High-rise buildings lined the road. There were Maccas and KFCs. Cars were everywhere. It was such a shock after the peace and tranquility of Greece's islands!

The car might have been new but it had a few quirks. How ironic that, every time we start to drive, and not until we're moving, a message comes up on the screen saying not to use the screen while we're driving, but the message doesn't go away until we press Agree!

Soon we got onto a main highway, and it was an amazing road. We cruised along at 140km/hr, the speed limit, on smooth roads and through tunnel after tunnel. Clearly, a lot of money had been poured into this road. The further from Sofia we got, the lighter the traffic became. By the time we reached Bansko, our destination, it was 11pm and we virtually had the roads to ourselves.

Our hotel wasn't the usual sort of place we stay in. It must have had hundreds of rooms, but the staff were good, the rooms were a decent size and they put us in a quiet section that faced the forest. We had afternoon sun to dry our washing and the restaurant downstairs was convenient for the few times we needed it. 

The view from our balcony:

The reason we came to this hotel is because we met the managers in a restaurant in a tiny village in Icaria, Greece, a few years ago. John remembered that they managed this hotel so, when we decided we were coming to Bansko, it was a no brainer that we stay here. We did meet up with the manager again, but he was only there for a day before going on holidays. Oh well!

Talking to the rather tired receptionist on night shift at our hotel, he told us that some of the apartments in the hotel complex are owned privately. Two nights prior, one of the owners was drilling in his apartment at 3am. The receptionist's phone was ringing hot with complaints. The guy wouldn't stop drilling so the receptionist cut his power off! Love it!

Bansko is a strange mix of a town. It has a historic centre with gorgeous old Ottoman-influenced buildings. Most of the more impressive buildings had either been converted to museums or restaurants.

The grander homes typically had high walls around them with gun holes for shooting at the enemy and hidden safe rooms inside. These homes were built in the 1700's, and times were turbulent.

We went inside one of these houses. It used to be the home of a wealthy merchant family. The son became a famous priest, Neofit Rilski, who founded the first Bulgarian schools, among many other achievements. He was born in this house in 1793.

We entered via a huge wooden gate set in the high wall, like all these houses have. Inside, a few buildings were set around a courtyard.

We explored the rooms with the help of an information sheet written in English. I love this concept - in order to teach people when there were few writing tools available, he used boxes of sand for students to write in!

The sink was set on an angle on the balcony on the second storey, outside the kitchen. The remains of food fell down into a trough below and the domestic animals ate them. A clever idea, but it must have got smelly with the animals living so close!

Nearby was Holy Trinity church, a stunning old stone and wood construction. The interior was strikingly painted. I took this photo before John saw a sign saying we can't take photos, so this is all I have.

Around the old centre were newer buildings. Many looked like a cross between Ottoman buildings and Swiss chalets! We found an entire street that had gorgeous buildings like these lining it. 

A pretty canal ran down the middle of the street.

In one part of the canal was a water race which ran into an old wool-washing tub. This was the same as the ones we saw in northern Greece last year. A shared culture isn't always interrupted by modern borders. (Northern Greece is only 50 kms away.)

This washing tub might have just been there to look pretty, however we found another one on the busy main road that was all set up for use. It even had the rails nearby to hang the blankets and large items that get washed here.

Clearly, there are a lot of wood fires in these houses. Huge piles of work were either freshly dumped, or neatly stacked, outside many houses. Someone told us that all wood has to come from an official supplier.

The mountains towered over the town.

John discovered a place that sold blue cheese and fig gelato! He loved it!

Being a ski town, the focus is on warm buildings and hearty food. One night we ate in a restaurant that was built out of massive logs. It's hard to appreciate the size of the logs from this photo. 

Because Bansko is a ski town, huge chalet-style hotels like ours sprawl around the outside towards the mountains. Multi-storey shops selling ski gear and classes line the main road. Scattered in-between are a few local shops. It's weird.

Bansko has a population of 10,000 people and 1,000 of those are digital nomads. Digital nomads are people who work totally online which means they can base themselves anywhere. Bulgaria is popular as it's cheaper than many European countries. I presume that Bansko is popular as it has everything you need plus skiing in winter and hiking in summer.

English is commonly spoken too, so we didn't have a lot of trouble with language. One blunder we kept making though is that "yes" in Greek is "ne". In Bulgaria, the exact same word means "no"! We kept saying no when we meant yes!

The town was really busy, partly because it's school holidays and partly because the jazz festival starts soon. We won't be here for it but I think it's a pretty big event.

When we change countries, there are always some obvious differences that hit us straight away. In Bulgaria, we can drink water from the tap. There are very few places where you can do this in Greece.  An incredible 40 million tourists visit Greece each year. They're all drinking water from plastic bottles. Just think how much plastic landfill, and litter, this creates.

But the best change for us is that we can put dunny paper in the dunny! In most parts of Greece, the plumbing can't cope with dunny paper. It has to go into a bin beside the toilet then gets put in the general rubbish. Not very pleasant but it's a fact of life. But we were so relieved to get to Bulgaria and find we could flush it! 

Not all changes were good though. Bulgaria does the European thing and has two single beds pushed together for a double bed. Each single bed has its own doona. It makes it very hard to cuddle up at night.

Bansko was interesting, but we were here to walk. The Pirin Mountains were literally on our doorstep. 

We had to organise a few things on the first day, so we just had a quick walk in the forest nearby. It wasn't exciting but the trees were lovely.

We spent the afternoon planning the next day's walk. It's amazing how much time it takes to scroll through various walking apps trying to find the best walks for us. The guidebook that we have isn't much chop in this department. How I wish we had the old Lonely Planets back!

Unfortunately, we were both a little bit off. I had a runny nose on our last day in Greece and we both felt quite lethargic for the next few days. Regardless, we set out on our big walk. Part of the attraction of this walk was that we had to catch the chairlift to the start of it. We paid for our tickets and I was surprised at how expensive they were - about $45 each. We soon learned why. The ride took 33 minutes! Two consecutive chairlifts carried us waaaay up the mountain. The weird thing was that there was no gearing at the places where everyone gets on and off. They had burly guys lined up to help people. You had to be 100% ready and jump on and off at the exact time. I'd hate to be doing that with skis!

The rides up and down were beautiful.

There was a gorgeous lake right at the start of our walk.

Like many ski or alpine areas, huts were scattered around, however the 'huts' here were more like huge hotels! 

The walk we chose was supposed to take 2.5 hours. Including rest stops, it took us four hours! The start was really steep. We scrambled up and up over large rocks for ages then had to do the same again going down the other side. It was tough going when we were both not operating at 100%. It was so difficult that I had to pack my camera away so I could use my hands which meant I didn't get any photos of the hard parts. Sheesh!

After the worst of the climb was over, the scenery became spectacular.

We reached our destination, Lake Popova.

Masses of tiny fish lived in the shallow edges of the cold lake.

There were so many gorgeous alpine flowers!

We couldn't have asked for better weather.

We came across a shepherd's hut.

At the end, we had a well-deserved and very late lunch. Bean soups and salad. Delicious!

Our other main walk began at the end of the road on the valley over from our first walk. It gets so busy there, and there are so few places to park, that they close a gate across the road at 8am. We got up there at 7.30am and had to park on the side of the road, despite all the signs telling us not to. We felt safe as everyone else was doing it.

We started at Vihren Hut. There were some gorgeous and rather fat horses roaming loose nearby. We've seen a few horses around Bansko. They've all been very heavy types.

More climbing up rocky paths.....

The walk took us to three lakes. The first one was beautiful.

We were thoroughly entertained by these two young women doing all sorts of poses for photographs. They nearly fell in.

There were many river crossings, usually on rocks.

Gorgeous views on the way to the second lake.

More wildflowers. They're so pretty! And this is summer. I can only imagine what they must be like in spring.

Lake Ribno Banderishko.

There was some remnant snow at this level - you can see some at the back of the lake.

Snow poles dotted the track down to Lake Okoto.

The rivers were shallow, rocky and very pretty.

We finished the walk and returned to our car. Entire sections of the road were lined with parked cars. And no, we didn't get booked!

John got a coffee at a restaurant on the road back. They kept the soft drinks and beer cool by running cold river water over them.

We had a busy day that day. We returned to our hotel, showered and put clean clothes on then headed into town. Parking was hard in Bansko but we found a car park where we didn't have to pay on our first day and we got a park there every time we needed it!

John had booked a haircut. The guy who cut his hair was half Egyptian, half Bulgarian. He was a great guy. 

John wanted to try some bulgarian wine and we found a restaurant nearby called Molerite Wine and Dine. We didn't know what it would be like but, to our surprise, it was great! The young sommelier was the son of the owners. He was enthusiastic and well-educated on wine. Not only did he talk about the wines but he gave us a tour of their cellar. There was wine in there from all over the world, including Penfolds and Peter Lehmann from Australia.

After choosing a great wine, we took Georgie's recommendations for food - cheese on the grill topped with melted butter, honey, walnuts and fig jam. Yes please! It came out on a sizzling plate and Georgie basted it in the butter and honey mixture. So decadent and so delicious!

John was blown away by this wine combo. Wine lovers, take a look at the grape varieties....

We staggered out of the restaurant, just in time to head down to the Rock Fest that was being held in the main square. A stage was set up and people stood in front or sat on the stone walls nearby. The huge Pirin Mountains towered in the background.

Spot the Aussie.

The waitress at a meal we had somewhere had told us that the bands at the Rock Fest can be good. Sometimes they play well-known songs like "Hiwey to Hee". We realised she meant Highway to Hell. The first band had a great singer but the music was a bit meh. I think it's hard to be part of a rock fest when you only have a lead guitarist, acoustic guitarist and a singer. The singer had a great voice though and all their original songs were in English. 

The second band was quite good. They were very Def Leppard-ish. Again, they sung all original songs in English. They had a base guitar and drums and were quite rocky. Sadly, no matter how long we waited, they didn't play "Hiwey to Hee!"

On our last morning we had a quick hike in the hills behind our hotel. After slogging up a VERY steep track for a while, I realised we were on the wrong track. It wasn't very pleasant at all and we eventually turned around. It was really tricky getting back down again. I wondering how on earth I got the path wrong. When we returned to the start of the track, I saw that the wrong track was right beside the right track and the right track wasn't obvious at all. Oh well.

So far, Bulgaria is really interesting. We can't wait to see what it's like when we get out of a popular area like Bansko.

Hooroo!
Heather and John