TRAVEL

WONDERS OF THE NORTHWEST

Prehistoric goddesses dancing in dark caves. Thick forests climbing up forbidding mountains, moist from the breath of hidden waterfalls. Intriguing museums where ancient gold treasures share space with... a nuclear power plant model. Red rocks frozen in phantasmagorical shapes, with macabre stories to add. Winding rivers passing by abandoned Communist-era monuments and factories, and picturesque monasteries. Towns that have seen better times, but still strive to reinvent themselves. Roman ruins amid drab modern houses.

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BULGARIA'S STILL-STANDING LENINS

Under Communism, there was hardly a place in Bulgaria without a monument to Lenin, or at least a street, a school, or a kindergarten named after him. Sofia, the capital, had a tall statue of him in front of the Largo, where the main institutions of the People's Republic of Bulgaria were situated.

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SMALL ISLAND, BIG STORIES

Аbout 15 years ago a spec of land off Bulgaria's Black Sea coast made it into the international news: archaeologists digging in the remains of a 5th century church on St Ivan Isle declared to have found authentic relics of... St John the Baptist.

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BULGARIA'S LESSER KNOWN MONASTERIES

Visiting monasteries in Bulgaria is one of this country's greatest delights. It is hard not to fall for their splendid scenery, beautiful old churches, naivist murals of saints and devils, smell of old wood, supposedly healing icons and sacred springs, atmosphere of bygone times and stories of medieval monks and Revival Period revolutionaries. The Rila and the Bachkovo monasteries are, understandably, inevitable, but once you have checked them out, there are scores of other places worth exploring. Here is a brief list.

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FAKE FOR REAL

From the social media uproar caused by the Paris summer olympics to the unfounded claims that a stabbing attack in England was perpetrated by a Muslim, and from the Covid-19 infodemic to former US President Donald Trump's vitriolic assails against Vice President Kamala Harris fake news rules the world. In many cases it has real consequences in real life. In fact the more heated the debate, the more facts are vulnerable to manipulation.

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ODE TO BULGARIAN TOMATO

Juicy, aromatic and bursting with the tender sweetness that comes only after ripening under the strong Balkan sun: the tomatoes that you can find on a Bulgarian plate taste like nothing else. From salad and stews to the emblematic lyutenitsa paste, they are a staple of local cuisine and a source of pride for their supposedly unique deliciousness. The fake news that the EU was planning to ban local tomatoes enraged hundreds of thousands of Bulgarians in the 2010s and 2020s.

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SLOW TRAIN GOING

How long does it take to cover 125 km? In a mountain range such as the Rhodope this is a difficult question. Even Bulgarian drivers who like to fly along roads as if they were exempt from the laws of physics have to slow down a bit along the winding roads of the Rhodope.

The Septemvri-Dobrinishte narrow gauge railway redefines the concept of slow travel. It takes the 125 kilometre long route in... 5 hours.

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WHO WAS DAN KOLOFF?

Heroic monuments, usually to Communist guerrilla fighters, are rather a common sight in towns and villages across Bulgaria. The heroic monument in the centre of Sennik, a village in the hills near Sevlievo, depicts neither a partizanin, nor a 19th century revolutionary. The wide-chested man of bronze who stands defiantly on his trunk-like legs was a... wrestler.

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RURAL BULGARIA'S CHARMS

Until the 1950s-1960s, Bulgaria was a rural country. The majority of Bulgarians lived in villages, as had their forefathers for centuries before. Rapid industrialisation and urbanisation under Communism sucked the life from Bulgarian rural communities. The hardships of the transition to democracy and the free economy post 1989 worsened what many see as rural depopulation.

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WHITE BROTHERHOOD DANCES

Some wars and rebellions, like the First Sioux Wars of 1854 and the 1903 Transfiguration Uprising in Eastern Thrace, and some seemingly small events that had significant repercussions, like the results of a German referendum that approved Hitler as the Führer – 19 August as a date is not without interesting history. However, for the thousands of people who on 19 August gather, dressed in white, above Babreka Lake in the Rila mountains, the date holds special importance.

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