Day 22 Bulgaria: Wednesday 1 July

It was Canada Day so many of the Canadians were in red. July 1 is also a big day for Bulgarians, many of whom travel to the Black Sea to be there for sunrise. Our boat was heading away from the Black Sea! The Danube is the border between Romania and Bulgaria so we essentially travelled along the entire northern border of Bulgaria from Oltenita.

The countryside is very agricultural but no farms. After the fall of communism 90% of the rural land was bought up by about 12 large companies so their farming is very industrialised with people travelling to work from the towns.

I must have taken a hundred photos of sunflowers. Sunflowers, grain and rose oils are the main exports of Bulgaria.

Evidently they can get up to 3 harvests per year.

These white storks are a big deal. They come to Bulgaria to nest in the summer and often choose the top of power poles and pylons. I was too slow to photograph any nests with stork families but got this one in a field.

Wednesday was a big day with a full day excursion, first to this village and then to an area of Bulgaria where their wealthy citizens have holiday homes. Bulgaria is the poorest country of the EU but it has made astonishing progress since the early 1990s when they stopped being communist.

This folly was a coffee stop. It was built 16 years ago.

They make and sell extremely strong rose liqueur.

The entrance to the bathroom was even weirder!

This was in the fancy village of Arbanasi. Note the guttering!

A former wealthy medieval house that is now a museum

The mother and baby’s room for 40 days after the birth.

The family room I think. They did a lot of sitting on hard, flat bed things.

The guides describe Soviet architecture as an oxymoron and it is amazingly awful to look at, but apparently not too bad inside.

Described as panel construction they are concrete panels welded together, which were built quickly to house a rapidly growing urban population.

Having said that, during communist times they had to apply for a larger apartment as families grew and it was normal to wait for 10-15 years, during which time 2 families may be sharing a 4 room apartment. Religion was frowned on and churches could not be higher than a man on a horse, so they built churches that look like barns and often had them built down into the ground.

We visited this church which looks like nothing much from the outside but is exquisitely decorated with frescoes inside. The frescoes tell the story of the bible. The predominant religion in Romania, Bulgaria and Serbia is the Eastern Orthodox Church.

Bulgarian countryside is very pretty but overall noticeably poorer than Romania. The people seem really nice though. There is a pervasive concern about Russia and the war in Ukraine as that is essentially next door to Romania and altogether too close.

There is a mixed ethnic and religious background in Bulgaria and evidently their history is of peaceful coexistence since about the 1400s. There unifying factor seems to be the oppression faced first by the Ottoman rule and then by the Soviets.

We had a coffee stop at a hotel in Tarnova which overlooks the Yantra river. Some of the group went on the walk up to the church but given the heat, most of us opted for a leisurely stroll around Tarnova. I got a couple of pairs of linen shorts and Pauline got a lovely frock. We were happy.

It was another very hot day so good to get back on the boat at Vidin.