UPDATE MAY 2023: We finally got to do this trip – see all the details here https://winingpoms.travel.blog/2023/05/02/black-sea-at-last/
Recuperating from a rather unexpected operation, my go-to ‘happy place’ is to plan a holiday. This year (2019) we had a fantastic trip to Slovenia – we hired a motorhome through Campanda (a sort of peer to peer site for motorhome owners willing to rent out their vehicles), flew to Ljubljana and spent 16 nights exploring that beautiful country.
After considering Croatia for our next trip, for some reason my eye fell on Bulgaria, and after a bit of internet research, my heart began to be set on exploring there. I’m a big fan of places that are not hugely popular with tourists yet, but developed enough to hopefully be safe to travel in. As part of the EU but not using the Euro yet, Bulgaria seems to offer a combination of history, scenery, welcoming people, good food, and of course, wine and beer, with prices that seem very reasonable after 15 years of living in Australia.
After locking in dates and booking flights – Adelaide to UK first to see family, then Easyjet to Sofia, and back to Adelaide from there, I do some costings and get some other quotes. Hiring just a car and using AirBnBs is quite a bit cheaper, but we have enjoyed motorhoming and money spent on holidays isn’t real money, so I decide to stick with that option.
We’ve used Anywhere Campers in the past and they were great, everything included, but unfortunately they can’t compete costwise with a local company this time and we don’t need their option of pickup and dropoff in different locations. Georgi from Rentacampa.bg in Sofia, that we find through Campanda, is great communications-wise, and offers to hire us a couple of bicycles to go with the camper for our trip. We’ve hired a Knaus Sky Wave 650 MGfrom them.
Next step is to start researching an itinerary. I’d love to be one of these people that can just ‘go with the flow’ and book up last minute as we go along, but I’m a bit too much of a control-freak to do that. Besides, planning a trip is half the fun!
So, first stop on the research trail is that old favourite, Tripadvisor. I post a general query and within a few days am blown away by one amazing contributor who sends me a whole load of information by pm about places to go, things to see, places we can stay at overnight in a motorhome. I never cease to be amazed by the kindness of strangers, and if this person is an example of how nice Bulgarians are, it’s a great sign.
Next step is Google MyMaps, to start by entering all the places of interest and get an idea of distances and travel times between places. I come up with an itinerary that combines a bit of natural beauty (waterfalls, mountains, caves, gorges, hot springs), a bit of history (Bulgaria has a LOT of history, going back further than I can imagine), some wine, beer and food exploration, and a little beach time.
So my itinerary looks like this: Sofia – Rila – Melnik – Rhodopi Mtns – Plovdiv – Burgas -Varna – Ruse – Veliko Tarnovo – Kazanluk – Sofia. Official Campsites in Bulgaria are few and far between, but Wild Camping is permitted as far as I understand from reading countless blogs, and from my helpful Tripadvisor (TA) friend, and Park4Night has a great map search function which I make full use of to check out and save GPS locations of likely overnight spots.
On reading through the fantastic information from my TA local again, I see “Burgas – Varna looks on the map like a short, easy and scenic road, but its not” and various other blogs have said that the one overdeveloped and heavily touristy bit of Bulgaria is the coastline, so I revisit the itinerary and change a few things around. My alternative route is now Sofia – Rila – Melnik – Rhodopi Mtns – Plovdiv – Shipka – Veliko Tarnovo – Varna – Ruse – Krushuna – Sofia which still gives a couple of nights at the coast, but allows a bit more exploration of the northwest corner of the country, and restricts daily driving to around 2 hrs maximum.
In terms of what there is to see and do along this route, here is my rough plan:
Sofia – couple of nights to explore the city before we pick up the motorhome. Stay in an AirBnB somewhere central, join in one of the free walking tours https://freesofiatour.com/ on the first day to get our bearings, and then explore the city by foot – or possibly hire a scooter from https://rentascoot.bg/ if we fancy something a bit different. I save a few useful blogs such as https://www.spottedbylocals.com/blog/48-hours-sofia-like-local/ and https://davidsbeenhere.com/2014/06/18/25-best-restaurants-bulgaria/ for suggested things to do and places to eat.
Rila – apparently there’s a chair lift to the top of the mountain where you can walk and try and find a vantage point to see all seven lakes. Handily it seems that we may be able to park overnight in the chairlift carpark, so after picking up our motorhome in the early afternoon, this seems to be a good first destination. This blog gives some good information https://ourtour.co.uk/home/team-daves-summit-attempt-the-7-rila-lakes and this one – https://travelwithbender.com/travel-blog/bulgaria/panichishte-and-bulgarias-famous-rila-monastery – reassures me that it won’t be too physically demanding for a slightly unfit middle aged couch potato such as myself (note to self: get on the exercise bicycle after writing this!)
Melnik – I find an overnight stop not far from the wine-making town of Melnik that is by some natural hot springs that you can bathe in. I also find a great map of wineries in and around Melnik, including bicycle routes between some of them https://bulgariawinetours.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Melnik-Wine-Routes-Map-Second-Edition-2017-FRONT-Final.pdf takes ages to load but worth it!
Rhodopi Mountains – this seems to be popular for winter sports, but there are more hot springs at Devin, or gorges at Trigrad, depending on how we are feeling after the previous days wine tasting! There are also wild bears in the woods around Trigrad. We saw some in Slovenia and I’d love to see some more, although maybe not quite such a close encounter as this tourist had there http://balkani.org/en/rules_bears/
Plovdiv – I first looked at wineries around Plovdiv, but then discovered it’s a bit of a craft-beer lovers destination, and as Mr Wining Pom fits that description nicely, it looks like this stop will be all about him! This site has some handy tips https://plovdivcitycard.com/blog/places-plovdiv-beer-lovers/ and again there’s a free walking tour we can join to get our bearings https://freeplovdivtour.com/?utm_source=pcc_blog&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=plovdivcitycard. I find a possible overnight spot which has a cycle path into the city next to the Hotel Landmark.
Shipka – time for a bit of history with the abandoned Communist monument here, as well as the famous (infamous) Shipka Pass – I like to give my driver a bit of a challenge every holiday and by now he should be confident about driving on the ‘wrong’ side of the road again and able to handle anything!
Veliko Tarnovo – as well as having one of the best camping sites in Bulgaria, this city is also supposed to be one of the country’s most beautiful. This site gives some useful info https://sofiaadventures.com/things-to-do-in-veliko-tarnovo/ and again, there’s a free walking tour we can join at 11am from in front of the Tourist Information Centre, if we get there early enough.
Varna – we’ve never been to the Black Sea, so we had to have at least one night there. I also quite fancy doing a 4×4 tour from there which gets good reviews on TA. I’ve contacted a company that organises them, http://www.visitbulgariaon.com, and have made a note of their contact details, as I don’t want to commit to being there on a particular date until we’ve seen how easy driving is, and our plans might change.
Ruse – on the banks of the Danube, this place is steeped in history, so will give us a dose of culture, before visiting some caves in the vicinity, the Orlova Chuka Caves.
I looked at travelling from Ruse back to Sofia in one day, but it seems a bit of a long trip, so I look for a good midway stop, decide against Pleven but am drawn towards the Krushuna National Park, with waterfalls and walking trails which sound great.
Final stop before handing the MoHo back needs to be at a campsite, so we can clean and empty tanks. I’ve found a place called Camping Zverino which will leave us about 1hr 30mins to travel the next day to return the Knaus to Sofia.
So that’s the plan, I have written up an itinerary, saved links etc, and started this blog. I’ll keep it updated as the planning progresses and more details are added, and then of course when we actually do it, I’ll see if the reality lives up to the imagination! Next step is to start learning a bit of the language, as the cyrillic alphabet used in Bulgaria is going to be quite a challenge! Off to read some more hints and tips from here https://www.claimcompass.eu/blog/tips-visit-bulgaria/
2022 Update
Well, has there ever been such an ill-fated trip? Firstly the online travel agent I’d booked our flights through – Bestflights – went bust over the Christmas 2019 break. After much to-ing and fro-ing Emirates Airlines kindly took over the booking for us…. but then Covid happened!
Our June 2020 trip changed to September 2020 (“it’ll all be over by then, surely!”) and then eventually to an Open ticket valid until April 2023.
Cancelled the Easyjet flight for a credit, no problem. Likewise the AirBnB in Sofia. Overnight at Travelodge not so good – lost our money there. Contacted Motorhome Hire Company and they agreed to hold onto our deposit until such time as we could use it. Never imagined it would be such a long gap though.
So now we’re in 2022, international travel has restarted, although not without its issues, and I’ve rebooked our flights (now from Melbourne as Emirates no longer fly from Adelaide) to March-April 2023, which will mean visiting Bulgaria from the first week of April until the third. Fingers crossed no more spanners in the works!
First problem is that many Bulgarian campsites don’t open till May, and the weather could be anything from wintery to springlike at that time of year. The itinerary may have to be somewhat ‘fluid’ to allow for this, but I’ll start off with the same bare bones and adapt as we go.
Wining Poms 