Wednesday 28 March 2018

Trip number three

Our third trip to bulgaria was a quick whistle stop 4 days in Lovech, we had passed through on our last trips but wanted to see more.
The flights were cheap as chips and we booked into The Old Lovech Guest House So after collecting our hire car we set off and after about 2hrs 30 mins we arrived in Lovech after a short stop at a roadside bar for a thirst quenching drink.

Roadside bar
Our accomodation was amazing and I can recommend anyone that goes to Lovech stays here. The place is owned and run by Dimitri who is an ex sailor and he has refurbished the place with the help of his sons. What he doesnt know about Lovech and the surrounding areas is not worth knowing

The Old Lovech Guest House


Lovely Blue Sky

The Old Lovech Guesthouse is in the old town and is surrounded by cobbled streets, its a bit awkward to find but thankfully our sat nav took us straight there, The first time we visited Lovech we didnt even know there was an old town.

Fancy climbing these after a few Bulgarian beers
The town has a lovely square with nice restaraunts and has the river Osam running through it and has a wooden covered bridge over it with souvenir shops all inside it.

The Old town square
We found it ideal to sit with a beer and watch the world go by

Nice cooling beer
Lovech has a fortress and it is well worth a walk up there and a look around it affords some great views over the town.

View over Lovech
We spent the next 4 days just wondering around the town and local area. There are some lovely villages nearby and we had a look at lots again with a view to moving there.
Sadly our time was soon up and we headed back to Sofia and handed back the hire car.

We shall see you again soon Bulgaria

Take care all









Sunday 11 March 2018

Trip number two

Now that we are half Bulgarian having spent 6 days there we couldn't wait to head back. So as soon as we returned to England we immediately booked flights and car hire. This time we were going for a fortnight again flying to Sofia but driving to Balchik on the coast and back but included in this trip we had arranged to view some houses with our estate agent Monica.
Easy jet delivered us on time and we picked up our car and set off.
We were driving to the Rousse area where we wanted to view some houses as it's a lovely place.
All I can say is it's a bloody long drive after after being up since about 3:30 am to catch a flight and with hindsight we should of split this journey up but you live and learn.
We finally arrived at our accommodation around 5pm absolutely shattered.
We had booked into a hotel in Ivanavo and although the hotel was clean and tidy there ain't much in Ivanavo, again you live and learn. The hotel was full of workmen and backed onto the railway line. Its saving grace was it had a lovely courtyard garden at the back and the workmen were friendly and not too noisy as they sat outside drinking beer every night.
The only place to eat in Ivanavo was our hotel and the lady that booked us in told us it opened at 7pm. So around 7 pm we sauntered down to find the door to the restaurant locked. We were joined by a couple of dutch cyclists who were also staying there and had also come to eat.
I knocked on the door and an elderly lady opened it and promptly shut it in my face.
We all laughed left it a minute then went in to much muttering from the elderly lady inside.
Our meal was delivered to us and we had no choice of what we were getting it was it was some sort of meat burger and rice but was OK.

Nice courtyard garden at our hotel
It was when we were in Ivanavo we met our estate agent Monica.
Monica picked us up from our hotel and took us out for a full day viewing houses in the area.
Our plan was to look at houses at around £10,000 but were livable in for a holiday home then renovate it when we finally moved permanent. We could afford to get 10K together but not much more for another 18 month.
Monica showed us a good selection of houses but it was clear they all needed work and who knows how much work till you start.
I'm envious of people who have the know how to renovate property where as I have to google which end of a hammer to hold, OK I'm not that bad but when it comes to knocking walls down and rewiring stuff I don't know my arse from my elbow and I just know we would end up living in a building site for years not what we want.
The last house Monica showed us was out of our price range but she wanted to show us the difference by paying a bit more what you could get.

The house she showed us was in a village called Karan Verbovka. It was stunning it had a balcony on the back overlooking the hills and on the balcony was a jacuzzi, 2 leather settees, a table and 4 chairs and a running machine probably to hang your washing on.
We changed our minds we were going to buy a house where we could move into it just meant we had to wait.

The view from the balcony of the stunning house

Nearby swimming pool in Opaka which cost us £1.80 a day to use 
We left Ivanavo after a few days vowing to come back to the area to look at more houses in 2018 (and buy one).

From Ivanavo we drove to Balchik on the coast where we had a chill out for a week.
Balchik is great a bit hilly but its like Spain was 30 years ago, no lucky men on the beach no pressure to eat in every restaurant you pass by and not to many Brits although there appear to be more Brits on the coast than inland. But it is the coast after all.
We stayed in a fantastic guest rooms called Yordanovi guest rooms
We are staying here again this year if you go to Balchik you will be hard pressed to find a nicer place to stay with a great friendly family running it. The owner is an ex Bulgarian policeman and his son speaks perfect English nothing is too much trouble for them.

Garden area and bbq
Our hire car and view down to Balchik

Balchik in the evening
From Balchik we started to make our way back across the country towards Sofia and stopped for a couple of nights in Veliko tarnavo or VT as its called.
VT is nice and worth going it has lots of nice bars and restaurants and an old town which we stayed in but it's busy, touristy and more expensive or at least more expensive than other places we stayed. It's just not our cup of tea.

VT

Everywhere in Bulgaria has statues

Courtyard restaurant

Cobbled streets

Nice quirky bars
After VT we made our way back to Sofia and back to Blighty.

We just had to go back


  • Till next time take care

Sunday 4 March 2018

Our first trip to Bulgaria

Our first trip to Bulgaria was in November 2016 where we hired a car and drove around for six days 2 days near Stara Zagora, 2 days in Targovishte and our last 2 days in a village near Lovech.
Since this we went back in June 2017 for two weeks where we drove from Sofia across country to Balchik for some beach time and back, having six days in Balchik.
We went back in September 2017 for 4 days and stayed in Lovech town.
Our next trip is July this year and another planned for October before finally moving permanent in December this year all going to plan.

We fly on those big orange planes from Manchester to Sofia which takes around 3 1/2 hours and the flights are about £70 to £80 return which is really good value.



Easy jet at Sofia airport.



On our first trip we picked up a hire car and set off towards the Stara Zagora area, leaving the airport we thought bloody hell where have we come to as there is a large Roma area with houses built out of all sorts of bits and bobs with corrugated iron roof's. The car doors stayed firmly locked. But as we drove out of Sofia in front of us were gorgeous mountains in the distance.

Stunning scenery ahead.

We arrived at our first hotel about 3 hours later just outside Chirpan we stayed at Hotel trendafiloff and at £12.50 a night each for bed and breakfast was another bargain. The hotel is just out of town but has a lovely restaurant and bar

Nice view from our room

Rush hour just outside Chirpan.
The following morning we met Minty and Pete who live in that area and write  http://movetobulgaria.blogspot.co.uk. over a coffee we picked their brains and gathered what we could in a short time. They are a lovely couple and we wish we had stayed longer talking to them but we were just mad keen to see some areas of bulgaria after what had been a full on day of travelling the day before.

We spent the next two days looking around the area and saw some lovely villages.

From here we moved on to the Targovishte area driving over the mountains. Bulgaria was growing on us it really is a beautiful country with friendly people.

Busy roads 

Shops for the fashion conscious
Friendly locals


We spent the next two days looking around this area which again is beautiful and where we are buying our house. Bulgaria is abundant in hills, forests , national parks and has the advantage of busy towns and cities on hand if you need them.

Fruit n veg market in Ruse, Rousse,Pyce all of which are different ways of spelling the same thing ?
The Blue ????? Danube which separates Bulgaria from Romania. Romania is on the other side of the river

Nice easy to read menus, 
After two days in this area we started to make our way back towards Sofia staying in a little village called Golets just outside Lovech for 2 nights.


We couldn't find our accommodation in golets  so asked a man with a horse for directions. Of course he spoke no English and all we could say in Bulgarian was " two beers please". So after a couple of minutes of charades and showing him our booking form with the address on he took us straight there, him and his horse. Just so friendly.

The lovely log fire in our accomodation
So pretty soon our six days were up and we had had a whistle stop tour and driven about 800 miles around Bulgaria.

One thing for certain we would be coming back the place fascinates and intrigues us. I'm sure there are some bad bits and some really shitty bits. But we love it. We saw some stunning sights, some beautiful sights and definitely some strange sights .

Until next time