Lion Hotel 3 Sofia

... have to see it for yourselves!). At first, Bulgaria seems bleak<br>and grey....and I don't think it's just the weather. The landscape<br>resembles a forgotten land &#8211; somewhere people used to live, but now<br>all that is left are crumbling houses, scrap heaps and the odd sheep.<br>The gardens on the other hand are lovingly cared for and meticulously<br>kept, and almost always finished off by a cabbage patch! <br><br>We step off the train onto a deserted<br>platform, then ...

Today is the final day in Istanbul and dominated by departure plans. Chris Brian and Austin are catching the airport bus at 1pm and I'm getting the train at 10pm. There's some delay due to getting up late and faffing. However we do get packed and I see them off on to the bus. Brian is trying to buy carrot juice with the Bulgarian ley which I must have passed him. Its surreal to be parting in bright sunshine in a square in ...

... turule. Seal müüdi igasugust padajanni. Uuridest kuni grammofonideni. Väga palju oli natsisaksa sümboolikaga asju. Seal nägime ka kuidas võib male inimesi köita. Vanadel oli pargis laud püsti ja mäng käis täie hooga vaatamata 9-le külmakraadile. Käisime ka Pirotska jalakäijate tänaval. See on kõige ehtsam kaubandustänav ja esimesel pilgul tundus pubi leidmine suht võimatuna. Siiski Tsar Samuili nurgal leidsime ühe keldriõlleka "Adams". Hinnad olid ...

... last walk around the town. On the bus, we arrived in Sofia 3 hours later. We jumped a taxi into town and he had no idea so we ended up god knows were. Eventually, with a little luck and intuition we found where we were. That day, half of Scotland it seemed were venturing back from Macidonia (World Cup Qualifier) to get there cheap flights home. With a few full hostels passing us over, ones not even there anymore, we stumbled on a stream of places, just down ...

... propaganda... Here the call out... (feel free to jo&#305;n me this summer (!) or just spread this information to everyone who is interested): Roll up! Roll up! It's the great Ecotopia Biketour 2008 extravaganza! Where? Bulgaria and Turkey When? 2nd July - 14th August *** Registration now open at http://www.ecotopiabiketour.net *** Ecotopia Biketour is a mobile community ...

... and I thought that the girls should go, and maybe if they saw a taxi they could convince it to come up and get us. Improbably, but better than nothing. Rich and I settled in to wait for our 5:30 bus. Suddenly the car pulled back up and everyone motioned us over. "We won't find a taxi," said the man. "They say we should just sit on each other's laps," said Charlotte. "They drove 100 feet and debated it for five minutes and just drove ...

... armoured police (complete with bullet-proof vests, face and arm shields) ensuring that order was maintained. Never saw anything like it before. Even as we were about a kilometre away you could feel their presence. We were frisked and searched prior to getting into the gates, as well as before making it to our section. Unfortunately Tania still had her Swiss Army knife in her purse, though fortunately, once she explained that she was indeed Canadian ...

... By this point my stomach was growling something fierce so I stepped out for a bite at the nearest restaurant. It was an outlandish American diner-themed chain restaurant called "Happy Bar &amp; Grill" complete with retro jukeboxes and young waitresses in go-go boots. While gazing into the Cyrillic letters on the ...

... compact so we were able to see all the sites. We walked around the churches and cathedrals in town. Even finding the church of Saýnt Sofia which Sofia was named from. We also found a Russian church and numerous Russýan monuments. There were frescoes all over the insides of these churches, but we were not allowed to take photos. I complied, quite sadly. We moved on and found one of the crappiest monuments I have ever seen. It was ...

... off the bus, we both burst into fits of laughter when i made the call, "Oh my God". Everything is written in Cyrillic so it was time to find the Lonely Planet phrasebook and make some sense to having the number 3 jumbled inside a word. We walked around for about half an hour and tried to find the town of Bansko on the buses noticeboards to no avail, that's when we stumbled on this little chap who saw us wandering around without a bloody clue and ...