Tag: Travel

Blink and you’ll miss it. Sofia

~ Veselin ~ 9 Comments

Sofia can give you moments of color and beauty that only exist for brief moments here and there, and only to the people who go out and look. Get behind the wheel and none of that exists. Here are a few moments from my morning walk.

  1. A rose in Sofia Tech Park. Behind – a trace from the real-estate bubble. Not far is the cosplay party G-fest where colorful young people are doing whatever they’re doing. I don’t understand it but their outfits are pretty.

2. A semi-abandoned building near Bulgarian Academy of Science. My usual path doesn’t go there but a door was closed and locked with a padlock. I needed it to be open. So I had to walk around and saw it. These little puffy things? There were a million of them.

3. The beekeeper

Someone is producing honey near BAS. Not sure how that works in an urban area with a very high population density, but as you see from the photo, it happened. These things are hives.

Sofia has the tendency to turn into a jungle and does it here and there. I guess, the bees thrive in those islands wilderness.

Did you like the photos? Drop a comment.

Dancers in Sofia

~ Veselin ~ 8 Comments

Young people use the reflection of the large glass windows to practice dancing.

I like how the new generation can make the environment their own in unusual ways.

This is the Largo area – The Cabinet with the large glass windows is on the left, The Parliament in the middle, and The Presidency to the right, with some roman ruins covered with glass domes in the middle.

From Kartala to Macedonia Hut (2)

~ Veselin ~ 4 Comments

We went to Macedonia Hut in June – and it felt like a great hike. Kartala has a good asphalt road and a large free parking, which makes it a very convenient starting point. Most of the hike is in the forest, which was great, given the heat wave over the last week.

This second time, we took all the possible shortcuts and slowed the pace as much as we could. As a result of both, we managed to reach the hut in slightly over 3h. The path with the shortcuts is slightly above 8km, +720~~ meters. Without the shortcuts, it’s over 9km.

It has these brand and new slightly optimistic signs. The actual distance as measured by our smart devices varied by +300 to +600 meters. I think some of the expected signs are not yet installed because we couldn’t find them.

The hut keeper cooked us food and the day was fine. We rolled back down tired and well fed.

Musala

~ Veselin ~ 9 Comments

We attempted to hike to Musala yesterday. We underestimated the time and effort for it and not only couldn’t reach the top but also got crushed and had bad sunburns.

The gondola to Yastrebets starts working at 8:30, which is when the journey should’ve started. Works until 18, which is when it should’ve ended. However, this is too much walking for a 6-year-old and his parents who are not in the best shape.

We set ourselves a time limit and turned around after 3h of walking, at around 2600 meters altitude, close to the Everest chalet. We needed another hour and some extra energy to reach the top. I think it’s doable with more stops and colder weather. We ended up doing 23000 steps on that day. Another 2 hours of walking would’ve made that 33000, way above anything we’ve done over the last 10 years.

It’s not that bad that we didn’t reach the summit because we only had one of the kids with us. Saved ourselves from the trouble of not having both of them. We may try again on a colder weekend, although with our current capabilities, the success is not guaranteed.

From Kartala to Macedonia Hut

~ Veselin ~ 18 Comments

We did our first true hike since we had children. I know we’ve been to Vitosha many times but Vitosha is almost a city park, it has lots of visitors, easy access, and is a low-effort adventure. Rila, on the other hand, is more remote, higher, and more scenic.

Our starting point, Kartala, is a small ski resort, 28 kilometers away from Blagoevgrad. The asphalt road to it is in a fine condition., Hut Macedonia is about about 9km further up in the Rila mountain. It should’ve been an easy 2.5h walk, according to all the websites we found. It might be 2.5 hours but you need to be in a good shape for it. For people like us, 3-4h is more realistic.

The path looks like this:

The trail is also accessible by vehicles with permit. It is used for supplying the hut and the nearby maintain rescue group. There are 3-4 well marked shortcuts that can cut maybe 2 kilometers from the total walk but are steeper and we only took them on the way down.

It starts as a continuation of the road Blagoevgrad-Kartala, however I would advise using the free parking at Kartala. The part of the road accessible for the public is maybe a few hundred meters and not worth breaking your car.

Took us 3h 10 min without any breaks for a total of about 26000 steps both ways, which is very close to my personal best since my phone started tracking in 2015.

We didn’t have any food so we were very happy that the hut keeper cooked for us and fed us well. The food was great.

The area is full of tiny creeks that all go to this small river, called Bistritza. I’d say it was moist. Lots of berries everywhere, still green, but once they’re ripe, the path will become even more challenging 😃

The altitude gain of this route is about 730 meters.