Vitosha National Park

We didn't need to be at the airport until about 1100, so rather than waste the final few hours, we  decided to get up early, breakfast and leave as quickly as we could and drive to the nearby Vitosha National Park, some 20 mins away.

Except it was Monday morning rush hour and the traffic was rather heavy with lots of cars pushing in and out, but the satnav worked fine.  Unfortunately, as we were almost out of town, I was about to cross a 4 lane junction when the lights turned amber and I had to stop quickly (the lights go red very quickly after amber here and I didn't fancy being half way across with 4 lanes of traffic bearing down on us from right and left).  We heard a crunch - b*gger.  We got out but luckily the chap behind us had stopped literally within an inch of our bumper - unfortunately the bloke behind him had been driving too close and had failed to stop in time.  I think the damage was only minor and I pointed to the lights by way of apology but they just shrugged, so we drove off and left them to it.

I was more than a little shaken, as although I was perfectly correct to have stopped and driver 3 was obviously too close, I didn't like the fact that I had contributed to their accident.  But we had to continue and soon found ourselves in a quiet suburb and then up into the national park.  We stopped briefly at the Dragalevtsi Monastery (same design as before) nestling in the woods.

It was a glorious morning;  the sun was shining through the trees and reflecting the fabulous autumn colours.  

Unfortunately it had taken us so long to get there, we only had about 10 mins before we needed to turn around and head for the airport as we needed to fill up with petrol en route.

Once at the airport we went over Minty with a fine tooth comb, but could find no further knocks or scratches so we went to hand the keys in requesting that they inspect.  We were told no one would be available to check the car for at last an hour, which I explained was unacceptable and given a previous bad experience in Italy (not true) we would not leave without the car being inspected in our presence.  To my surprise the guy in the booth then came back down with me and looked for himself, agreed the car was perfect and phoned through to the booth where Ian was waiting and our deposit was immediately released.  Sometimes you just need to stand firm.

Much relieved, we headed for the lounge which was very quiet (only 1 other person, so I don't know how we managed to sit behind him!).  It was adequate but basic and self service - Ian found a bottle of champagne and opened it with uncustomary aplomb.  I then browsed the food on offer which wasn't terribly good but there were quite a few items in sealed containers (ie. transportable) so as our best friends Sue and David were due for dinner later in the week I thought it might be fun to create the starter course from items filched from Sofia Airport; including pâté, a lovely tomato/garlic paste and cheese.

Plus assorted nuts and dried bagels.  I managed to stuff quite a few bits into my case.

We got chatting to a lovely young couple when I moved our bags so they could sit down (luggage and coats do not need their own seats) - he was Bulgarian and she British Malaysian.  I'm not sure they really believed our primary reason for visiting Sofia (achieving BA Silver status) but it was a good talking point and we spent an enjoyable half hour exchanging travel tales until the flight was called.  (Note: She then sat with us in Business Class and he was down the back, although did visit once the food had been served!)

A couple of aerial shots to finish with.  

All in all a good time and it achieved our purpose, although there are probably more interesting/picturesque areas to visit - next time!

North of Sofia

Today we decided to head North about 110kms to the small town of Vratsa.  There were a number of places that sounded interesting an hour or two's drive further on, but that would have then meant a 3hr drive home and regrettably I felt that was too far.

Ian found us a lovely, scenic route through the Iskar Gorge and we took our time enjoying  the winding road (very safe, low speed limit, plenty of crash barriers and generally good driving).  

Frustratingly, parking bays never seemed to co-incide with the glorious views, but we stopped where we safely could.

Ian loves a rope/slat bridge (not)

Fishing is obviously very popular

Minty and the Old Bird again

We drove past this lovely church and decided to stop and explore a bit which unfortunately involved crossing the railway line (unfortunately I have a pathological fear of railway lines and even ones with barriers fill me with terror).

We ventured down some steps and came to a beautiful, overgrown, graveyard.  On one side male and female graves were in separate rows and in another area more simple, family plots.

The setting was lovely, beside the river with the view back up to the church.  What a place to finally rest, sigh!

Sharp-eyed Ian spotted this little frog so I spent a few minutes terrorising it (with my camera, I hasten to add!).

We drove on towards the Cherepish Monastery but in fact passed it without realising and had to double back.  It was similar in design to the monastery at Rila but considerably smaller and it was surprisingly difficult to park.  There were quite a few people around, being very noisy and behaving quite inappropriately given the setting - we surmised that a Christening had just taken place, but who knows?

The riverside setting was beautiful.

And the graveyard for deceased priests quite lovely.

We then drove on to Vratsa as Ian was particularly interested in seeing the Rogozen Treasure, a collection of 6th-4th century BC Thracian silverware which was unearthed in 1985 by a farmer digging to lay new drainage pipes on his nearby land.

We stopped at a Lidl Supermarket on the outskirts of town and bought some rolls and cheese for lunch.  As we were getting back into the car, a chap called over saying he'd heard English being spoken and just wanted to say hello.  He was doing advisory work for a nearby religious community and although he didn't know exactly where the museum was, he was able to give us the helpful info that parking was free on a Sunday.  Driving through the town we saw a lovely park and decided to stop there for our lunch; turned out the museum was just the other side of this rather communistic square.

We were the only visitors on a Sunday afternoon and I think the curator himself came over to greet us.  He decided Ian was definitely in the concessions age group and helpfully undercharged me too - £1 instead of £2.  He then gave us detailed instructions as to which areas of the museum we should see first, saving the Rogozen Treasure until last - I think he didn't want us to go straight to that and then leave (which we would have done).

We spent an interesting hour or so looking at various things; a lot of which were only captioned in Bulgarian so we weren't quite sure what we were looking at but there were a couple of superbly preserved 2,000 year old skeletons.

When we left, we wandered across the very large square and had a cup of tea/beer, but once again the overpowering cigarette smoke made us hurry to leave.

We opted to take the shorter in miles route home, which involved driving across the mountain (hill) but although the road was quite winding, the surface was good and there was very little traffic.  The view from the top was lovely.

We stopped to investigate this little church.

There was no one there to tell me not to, so I took a sneaky shot, but it was so small I couldn't fit the altar in.

A pretty, but tatty, butterfly.

Last view of Minty and the Old Bird.

The rest of the driving home was on a fast road and uneventful apart from a 20 minute deviation for road works.

Having parked the car safely back at the hotel, we walked into town for a final meal on Vitosha Boulevard.

A couple of the illuminated churches we passed on the walk home.