"For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move; to feel the needs and hitches of our life more nearly; to come down off this feather-bed of civilization, and find the globe granite underfoot and strewn with cutting flints." - Robert Louis Stevenson

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Random Snapshots from Bulgaria

I am currently making my way towards Florence - who knew Eastern Europe is so large!? Lots of trains.

Before I left, I did a whirlwind tour of Bulgaria, managing to stop in three cities - Veliko Tarnovo, Plovdiv, and Sofia. It's been a really fun time - Bulgaria is tough because of their crazy Cyrillic alphabet, but if someone is looking for a fun trip to take, Romania and Bulgaria are beautiful and interesting.

Veliko Tarnovo was the medieval capital of Bulgaria and has the ruins of a huge fortress, which we visited in a blizzard:

[click to enlarge]

The place is really gigantic - crazy to imagine what it must have been like when it was fully built up.


They have a church there with amazing paintings inside. You have to pay extra to take pictures inside, so instead here is a detail of one of the doors:


Moving on to Plovdiv... there is a large Roman amphitheater in the middle of town - a road runs underneath it.


Kitty at the theater wonders if maybe his tickets were for another night:


Beautiful painted plate:


Painting inside the archway of a mosque:


I was touring Plovdiv with Australians. Lesson: Aussies do not like cold. They got cranky and marched off to find a coffee shop:


I don't think my hiding will be very successful if the internet can find me:


Kitties everywhere!!


The houses in the old section of Plovdiv are gorgeously painted:


Confidential to Mahaba: I met your Bulgarian cousin. He's a nice dude. He said to pass on this message: "meow mew mrow mrow mew purrrrr."

3 comments:

  1. Aww that kitty is so cute in the snow waiting for the theater to commence! And don't you think that second one looks little tiny bit like Ella? :)

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  2. well...that was Mahaba's response to her cuz...I'm sure he'll be able to interpret it.

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