Hotel Edelweiss Varna

... vocal competition (annual, pop)

• Easter music festival
• Classical ...
  Varna, Varna, Bulgaria ronamaltz

... a "seller". I asked him what he sold..."fruit?" "vegetables?" I offered... he looked confused and repeated that he was "a seller". I, thinking he was deaf, offered the possibility that perhaps he sold "clothes". He looked even more confused and started reeling off the names of towns: "Liverpool, Dublin, London, etc" A sailor, he was a sailor. No wonder he looked confused, the very idea of sailing a banana!!

We cycled out of Varna across a two-kilometre, four-lane ...

... showing us how to make a bacon and egg pie. We enjoyed the ambience of the place and were farewelled by our host from afar as we made our way to the bus.

Varna is the second largest town in Bulgaria with a population of about 1 million after Sofia (2m) which is 400km to west. Bulgaria has a population of 8m It has a well developed tourist industry, business centre and transport hub including an international airport, large seaport and ...

I met Albena last Christmas, she is married to Rick Harper a Washington National Guard Soldier and contractor at Fort Lewis. They had had moved from Virgina, and Albena was not yet working and had not met many people.

She grew up in the beautiful coastal city of Varna Bulgaria, and all her family was still ...

A very nice place and quiet resort, is ideal target for family with kids, food and drinks very cheap and the people are friendly. About the security reasons I saw all the time the officers from Security companies -armed- and Police patrols on the street, here you need just to choose the proper location and enjoy the time.

... where the hot, fresh water and the cold(ish) Salty water meet, and the kiddos splash around and the old people soak their bones. Cute. There is also a natural hot bath along at the end of the beach where I went one night for a soak. Its the little things in life.

A strange tradition that we stumbled on in Varna is called July Morning, which is based on a song by Uriah Heap by the same name. Apparently, since the end of communism, everyone in Varna, and along the ...

... us all out at 9.30 to go and drink on the beach together.

We really haven't seen anything in Varna just sat on the beaches during the day and drunk at night time. We have in the end enjoyed our time here in Varna just there aren't many stories to tell or write about, it was just like hanging out with our mates from home. We didn't even manage to take a single photo.

To Istanbul we go.

11th June

Nessebar to Golden Sands (near Varna) Bulgaria

Sunny 30 degrees

We left lovely Nessebar and drove north to the seaside resort of Golden Sands, near Varna. We knew it was going to be difficult to find the hotel as we only had vague directions and no GPS map for the area. We thought we were in the right area and asked our first local for directions who told us that there had been a landslide ...

... and caught a bus to Golden Sands where the dive center was, it was owned by a guy called Harry who was a little bit 'happy'. It was a nice dive though it was just to a small coral reef instead of the wreck dive we were going to do due to poor visibility but as i hadn't dived in about 4 or 5 years it was probably for the best. I did get to sea lots of fish and things and i collected a few shells so it was all good. Dossed around ...

... I was told that if a few sketchy individuals started lurking about me, to jump in the nearest cab. I've been warned about ATM machines that steal your code. I was warned about Romanian taxi schemes, pickpockets, wild dogs, and I have read about unexploded landmines in Serbia and Bosnia (this one I take seriously). I am not saying that one shouldn't be careful and aware of their surroundings, particularly at night, but I have ...