24
Sep
2026
The weather didn’t cooperate on Wednesday for a walking tour of Tsarevets as scheduled. Bill and I walked around the town and explored an artisan neighborhood that was formerly the Old Market in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Before lunch our tour group visited the Dryanova Monastery. The Dryanovo Monastery “St. Archangel Michael” is a functional Orthodox monastery situated in the picturesque gorge of the Dryanovska River. It is a major spiritual and historical center, particularly noted for its role in the 1876 April Uprising. The dead from this uprising are buried an ossuary onsite.
For lunch we visited very tiny village of Salasuka – just a few houses. We were hosted by a local family who provided lunch and a demonstration on how to make banitsa – similar to tiropita but with yougurt and cheese in a filo dough.
Our evening entertainment with the group was a private sound and light show under a full moon. The show tells the history of Bulgaria through music and lights projected onto the fortress. We walked back to the hotel through some back streets that we had not found on our own. It was much quieter than the main pedestrian road and gave a peek into what the traditional homes might have looked like in the 19th century.
Thursday we checked out of our “Red October” hotel in Veliko Tarnovo. The best feature of this hotel was its location, an easy walk to old town and a fabulous pool and spa area. The staff was grumpy, the breakfast was boring, the twin rooms were bare bones, no chair or closet.
The sun came out and it was a lovely cool day. We had our tour of the ancient fortress at the top of the mountain. The bus dropped us off at Tsars Plaza where we had watched the fireworks on Tuesday night. From there it was a vigorous walk on cobblestones up to the church – Patriarchal Cathedral of the Holy Ascension of the Lord.
Georgi explained the layout of the site and took us in the cathedral. Afterwards we had some free time to wander the site and enjoy the views.
After all the glorious churches we have visited on this trip, the painted frescoes inside were a surprise. The Communist government in the 1980s hired an artist who painted sad scenes of Bulgarian history, reminiscent of a Dantes Inferno. The cathedral is no longer functioning as an active church.
Our drive back to Sofia didn’t work out as planned. We had to skip the planned stop in Troyan at their cultural museum because the town was having “sewage” problems and everything was closed. Then we couldn’t stop at the famous Progodna Cave because the hike there was muddy and slippery. Maybe next time. We reached Sofia around 2.30 pm to the elegant Intercontinental Hotel. This gave us time to visit a few sites we had missed at the beginning of the trip.
Bill and I went inside the crypt under the Hagia Sofia church (red brick one). There are several layers of stone and brick necropolis where many people were buried in the 2nd thru 6th centuries. The current church was built in the 6th century on the remains of precious churches.
We also popped into the nearby National Art Gallery – it is a very large building and the exhibits go on and on over multiple wings and floors. I enjoyed the Bulgarian artists. The featured special collections of Goya were just okay.
We didn’t have a real lunch today so Bill and I had wine and some starters at the hotel restaurant to hold us over until the farewell dinner at a nice traditional Bulgarian restaurant. The food was decent and we were entertained with folklore music. The food was not as good as other meals in Bulgaria – shopska salad, meatloaf style beefsteak with marinated raw vegetables, potatoes and bread and grapes for dessert. We said goodbye to our fellow travelers, our guide and driver. Overall this was another successful Gate1 trip.
