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At the end of the last text we mentioned that we ended up cleaning a hostel in Bulgaria. You probably asked yourselves how this came about. But before we tell you lets bring everybody up to speed by explaining how we got to Bulgaria in the first place. If geography was your strong point in school, then you will have no problem following along. If not, all will become clear by the end of the text. As everybody knows, Bulgaria is accessible by either Romania or Italy. It is safe to assume that everybody knows that… … Just kidding! In truth, Italy is quite far from Bulgaria but I am happy you immediately caught the mistake in the above sentence. See, all those hours attentively listening to you teacher way back when have paid off! No, Bulgaria shares a border with Romania, Turkey, Macedonia, Serbia and Greece. But the problem for us was that Serbia as well as Bosnia are both very expensive for insurance (Bosnia does not border Bulgaria but we would have had to pass through it). And come to think of it Macedonia was also quite expensive for insurance. So our only other option was to go via Croatia, Hungary and Romania. But we were quite curious about visiting Albania, something which would have been possible by going the direct south route. But we were happy that regardless of the route we chose, we would see Slovenia. Did you know that many of these countries used to be part of Yugoslavia? So, would we go to Slovenia, Croatia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria then Turkey or would it be Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia, Greece then Turkey? A little lost? So were we, and more than once. Now where were we? Oh yes, Italy. So after asking a few directions… “You want to go to Bulgaria? Alright, just go down Slovenia all the way to Croatia. OK? Good. Now once you get to Croatia you will see Serbia on your right but KEEP GOING STRAIGHT until you get to Hungary. Once you get to Hungary you will see Romania on your right, take the exit. So you go along Romania and eventually you will see the Ukraine on your left but DON’T go there, you will only get lost. So you continue along Romania until you see the exit for Bulgaria and you are there. Simple!!!” Hummmm… All kidding aside the start of our route was quite simple (the one we wrote about in the last text that brought us up to Hungary). But once we crossed the border in Romania things started getting more confusing. Signage, which up until that point had been quite good, suddenly became scarce and dogs seemed to be everywhere. In fact, it felt like we were back in Latin America, minus the warm weather. But nothing could prepare us for the frustration of trying to find our way around Bucharest after a very long day of riding. In total, it took us no less than 3 hours to find a place to sleep. What made the experience all the more frustrating was that we had the telephone number of a hotel but could not get a phone to call. As was the case in Italy, we were finally given directions by the police. Here is a picture from Bucarest.. It seems empty but there were cars everywhere, and dogs too... We did not spend much time in Romania and the day after our arrival in Bucharest we made our way to the city of Varna on the Black Sea coast in Bulgaria. But once again, we spent almost 2 hours trying to find a hotel and, as was the case in Bucharest, we had a number but no phone. We are among a relative few motorcycle tourists who do not have a phone but we are happy to say that after these two incidents we remedied this situation and are now the proud owners of a Nokia cell phone! As for cleaning the hostel it goes something like this. After going in circles in Varna we finally found our hostel only to find out from the owner that it was closed. In fact, the owner (Dave) and his friend Kevin were busy cleaning the place just prior to the official start of the tourist season. It might have been the look on our faces but Dave not only let us stay there, he and Kevin brought us to a comfy local restaurant for a fun evening. We had such a good time we decided to stay an extra day and it may have been after a few too many drinks that a promise was made to clean the hostel. And that is how I ended up cleaning the toilets of a hostel while Marie did the floors. Dave and Kevin...
Street in Varna...
The beach in Varna...
 Next up, Istanbul and visas, visas and more visas. Brian |
