Hotel Downtown Sofia

... I wouldn't go burning up those frequent flyer miles to come here but for me it's the ideal urban environment. If you haven't figured it out by now, I really enjoy cities and uncovering what makes the place tick. I am really into this place and what it has to offer people watchingwise.<br><br>Sofia didn't burn up too much memory on my camera card because try as I might, I just couldn't get the proper camera angle to make the drab architecture more ...

... something. But, my Bulgarian driver in Macedonia disagreed; he upheld Slavic Serbia's claim to the land. So, everywhere I went, I got a different story.<br><br>The Bulgarian and I stopped for coffee in view of one of Macedonia's Olympus-sized mountains we had to go around. A Serbian had told me a famous poet/traveler had declared the Balkans to be the most magnificent land on Earth.<br><br>On the other side of that visible mountain was Kosovo, and army vehicles with ...

... her &amp; shut our cabin door in her face. We were positive we were going to be thrown off at the next stop until another guard came along who could speak a tiny bit of English. I think the only thing that saved us was pointing out the fact that we had 1st class tickets &amp; there was no 1st class on this train, he just signed the back of the tickets &amp; let us go... PHEW! 09/01 - So there is absolutely nothing to do in Sofia ...

... und machen, das wir weg kommen... und hoffen, dass unser Gepaeck noch da ist, wenn wir wieder kommen. Auf dem Weg aus dem Bahnhof werden wir schon wieder von Taxifahrern belagert, wir machen, dass wir weg kommen vom Bahnhof. Weiter drin ist der Stadt ist es tatsaechlich ganz schoen. Als erstes fruehstuecken wir in der Sonne auf einer Bank vor dem Theater. Wir kommen am Sitz des Praesidenten vorbei und wie es unser Glueck so will, findet da mal wieder ein seltsamer ...

... her eyes, and yelling in a very condescending manner to me in Hungarian. Probably best I didn't understand. All I did was order the chicken by pointing to the sign. I'm not kidding, that's all I did. I was overwhelmed, she left me pretty devastated. And I haven't even told you about the bus driver (outside of Hungary though) that was so abusive I ended up crying and about whom I am writing a letter of complaint. I don't know, Scott and I have traveled ...

... has to offer. Then it was off for more fishing, the guys actually caught a few this time. Erin and Daniela found wild strawberries along the river. They were incredibly sweet! We headed home, Paul and Erin's home, and were pleased to have our missing suitcase arrive. Time to sack out for the night - leka nosht - good night in Bulgarian. :-)

... languages and at the end of it, we had an agreement upon a reservation for the 19th of October. Bro and I went to the bus station. Old LP marked a spot on the map as a bus station and I got some information outside. A woman told me (in fractured English) that a bus would come "here" for Sofia at 3.00 pm. Good; it was 2 pm. We had an hour to find a place to stay in Sofia. I had no guidebook for Bulgaria. I went online to a hostel booking website and began ...

... themselves to be asses again that night by yelling at Stefan and Toni. While hanging around the Hiker's Hostel in the morning, Stephanie mentioned wanting to go to the Rila Mountains and asked if I'd like to go along. I like hiking and wasn't in a big hurry to get to Sofia so said I'd go (or it could just be that Stephanie is really pretty and that decided it for me). Stefan helped us with travel plans. There wouldn't be a bus to Rila 'til the evening so we had the ...

... less successful. I was attempting to get to the Rila monastery, some way south of the city. There is one direct bus there each day, and one direct bus back. I managed to miss my first bus by two minutes - it was literally pulling of the bus station as I walked in. Feeling brave, I thought I would try to negotiate the local buses and get there anyway. This is a very bad idea because: 1 - I can't read cyrillic (russian alphabet) 2 - people over here often can't speak ...

... and watched people from the Kuwaiti, Swedish, & Israeli embassies dine. The food was scrumptious and plentiful and, the company, as Yanna would say, "very nice." Together we escaped dinner by heading to a great club called escape. This one even had people! We danced for a while, got home around 3:00, watched some CNBC, and lulled ourselves to sleep with Gangsta's Paradise, What if God Was One Of Us, and other assorted music from 1995 Grammy's. After an enormous and yummy ...