Anyone who is even remotely interested in looking at the world from the window of a car will instantly know that driving through Bulgaria's lesser and off-the-beaten track roads is absolutely the best way to take in the natural and cultural beauties of this country and to experience a first-hand interaction with its people.
Beyond the E871 highway and after the last premises of Sofia's Business Park, a white metal palisade shields an immense building site. The borehole drilling resonates from within. The summer sun is burning. With Vitosha mountain against a clear blue sky for a background, a sandy country lane meanders up a plateau.
Colourful weeds grow tall on both sides of the lane. Modest houses in peeling orange, green or yellow hide behind the old trees. Above them, towers a massive concrete structure, rising from the plateau: Kambanite, or The Bells.
When the young Patrick Leigh Fermor – a man considered one of the 20th century greatest travel writers – visited Ruse in 1934, he stumbled upon a strange town.
These include, but are not limited to, bad or non-existent asphalt, unpredictable and uncared-for potholes, confusing signage, maniacal drivers and traffic cops that contribute to the problems rather than try to solve them. Yet anyone who is even remotely interested in looking at the world from the window of a car will instantly know that driving through Bulgaria's lesser and off-the-beaten track roads is absolutely the best way to take in the natural and cultural beauties of this country and to experience a first-hand interaction with its people.
Whitewashed houses of stone and clay brick, with bay windows and heavy roofs of crooked tiles or even stone slabs: this is what Bulgarian traditional villages and towns look like.
Stretching for over 12 km, the sand ribbon by the Black Sea between Shkorpilovtsi to the south and Kamchiya to the north is a quiet spot blessed with clean sand, pristine sea and a thick longoz forest abuzz with wildlife, including the region's notorious mosquitoes. Many Bulgarians go to Kamchiya beach in summer, as it never gets crowded and accommodation is cheap. You can choose between rundown bungalows built under Communism or free camping. Construction in the area is prohibited, as a significant part of it belongs to a nature reserve.
А wise ruler who made Bulgaria a regional and international political and technological leader, and who tirelessly worked for the prosperity of the entire nation. A stupid person who caused the Bulgarian economy to collapse at least twice. A sly politician who played Soviet Union leaders like a fiddle, securing much-needed resources for the Bulgarian economy in the midst of a global oil crisis. A national traitor who was ready to make Bulgaria just another republic of the USSR. A patriot dedicated to protecting this nation's sovereignty from a possible attack by Turkey.
The throngs of tourists jostling for a better view of the Mona Lisa have become so overwhelming that the Louvre is already planning to exhibit it in a separate space. Such obstacles are not encountered when viewing Ahinora, a painting of a woman with eyes as enigmatic as Mona Lisa's smile, created by one of Bulgaria's most prominent painters.
Painted in 1925 by Ivan Milev (1897-1927), Ahinora mesmerises with her oversized, green eyes: feverish and fixed with fear, amazement or curiosity about something or someone beyond the frame.
With established resorts, new resorts and resorts under construction, the southern Bulgarian Black Sea coast sometimes appears to be one big development site. In summertime, when the crowds flock to the bustling compounds of Sunny Beach, blue-collar paradise Primorsko and nouveau riche-attracting Lozenets and St Vlas, it can become overwhelming. Nevertheless, there are some places between Burgas in the north and Rezovo in the south that have miraculously resisted concrete development. What about the strip of coast between Cape Emine and Burgas?
Аt first glance Dobrich might disappoint. The town is in the heart of Dobrudzha, in a region that's one of the first where the Proto-Bulgars settled at the end of the 7th century. Nothing of note has remained from these early times; after the Pecheneg inroads in the 11th century, this part of Dobrudzha remained depopulated for centuries. The precursor of Dobrich appeared in the 16th century, in Ottoman times. Its name was Hadjioglu Pazardzhik.
Summer is here, so going to the seaside for some fun, sun, sand and a swim is no longer a whim – it is a necessity! But where should you go? If you do not want to join the thousands of Bulgarians and Romanians heading to the border crossings with Greece, then Bulgaria is the obvious answer. Although the hectic overdevelopment that has plagued the Bulgarian Black Sea coast since the 2000s continues, there are a handful of beaches that still offer a sense of freedom, clean sand and an alluring sea.
Devoted freedom fighters, manly Red Army soldiers and workers, visionary or thoughtful Communist leaders: this is what comes to mind when we think of Communist-era public art statues and monuments. Indeed, these archetypes of exemplary regime citizens were produced en masse between 1944 and 1989 and can still be found all over Bulgaria.
Authenticity, genuine patterns and natural materials are all the rage in interior design today. Current trends are all about handcrafted products that are beautiful to look at, do not pollute the environment and are not harmful to your health with microplastics and dust-generating synthetic materials. Finding such interior products is not easy. But in a small town in Bulgaria you can find a surviving tradition that for centuries has produced amazing hand-woven carpets in stunning designs, using real wool and natural dyes.
Let's try a thought experiment. You are in a closed room, without windows, with only a smartphone connected to the Bulgarian Facebook, to get information about what is going on in the country and the world. Soon you will discover that thanks to the content uploaded by social media users, you will be able to keep track of the change of seasons. Everyone complaining about the mile-long traffic jam on the motorway to Greece and/or boasting about their homemade kozunak sweetbreads? Ah, Easter is coming. Your feed is full of little children with heavy rucksacks and gigantic bouquets?
A group of barefoot men and women dancing in a large circle of live embers, while hypnotic music beats a rhythm that gets under your skin and into your blood: Firewalker dances in Bulgaria are a spectacular rite to watch. A tradition whose origins are lost in time, the nestinari dances almost disappeared in the 20th century, but were eventually revived, albeit modernised, to appeal to a modern audience hungry for Instagrammable and TikTokable "authentic" experiences.
When the first European travellers saw Pobiti Kamani near Varna, they could not believe his eyes. The massive stone pillars emerging from the sandy, shrub-covered wilderness made Viktor Teplyakov, a "special missions officer" in the Russian army during the Russo-Turkish War of 1828-1829, to rein his horse. He wanted to explore, but there was no time.
Oh, the Bulgarian rose! From promotional videos to bars of soap sold in tourist traps across the country, the image and scent of the emblematic flower has become synonymous with Bulgaria itself. A traditional crop, vital to the international cosmetics industry, Rosa damascena embodies the beauty, uniqueness and value of Bulgaria – the perfect symbol for a country trying to establish itself on the global travel market.
From Lord Byron to Hungary's Sándor Petőfi to Cuba's José Martí: poetry has a fair share of authors who deserved to be labelled revolutionary not only because of their groundbreaking stanzas and language, but also for their political stance and activities. Bulgaria has Hristo Botev.
From Roswell to Project Blue Book in the United States and Project Condign in the UK, the military have always been interested in finding possible extraterrestrials on planet Earth. The Bulgarian Army is no exception. But its efforts to make contact with possible aliens have nothing to do with the image of gloomy researchers sifting through grainy photographs of UFOs and interviewing frightened locals who claim to have been abducted by little green men.
If there is one river that defines Europe in terms of landscape, history and economy, it is the Danube, a 2,850 kilometre ribbon of water that flows from the Black Forest in Germany to the Black Sea in Romania. Some 470 km of its course make up a significant part of Bulgaria's northern border – and of its history, economy and life.