Entries about art

At lunchtime we were due to catch the bus to Veliko Tarnovo, but we managed to fit quite a lot into the morning.

The first place we went was another gorgeous National Revival house (the Old Town is full of them).

In the courtyard we admired the roses - right now we are in the middle of the rose season in Bulgaria.

From there we walked down the road to the Roman stadium remains, popping into one or two antique shops on the way (one of these shops had lots of amazing old painted wooden chests - we both coveted them, but potential transportation difficulties put us off buying any).

The stadium lies in front of Dzhumaya Mosque, in the middle of the main shopping street. The seating in the stadium is made of the same gleaming white marble as those in the Roman amphitheatre.

Our next destination was the intriguingly-named 'Singing Fountains' within Tsar Simeon's Gardens. I visited this park back in March, but it was still a bit wintry-looking then, plus I didn't go as far as the fountains. This time all the trees were fully in leaf and the flowers had bloomed. The fountains turned out to look quite impressive, set within a massive pool which I was desperate to swim in. The sun was very hot and the water looked so inviting! No evidence of singing though...

After staying there a while we suddenly realised what the time was. Quick march back to Guesthouse Old Plovdiv! On the way back we saw part of a procession celebrating the Day of Culture & Literacy. This public holiday celebrates the Cyrillic alphabet in particular.

We took a taxi to the North bus station, where I bought our tickets to Veliko Tarnovo. We had a bit of time to kill then, so we took turns to go next door to Lidl while the other person stayed to look after the bags.

Tryavna is famous for its woodcarving and icon-painting traditions and also for its National Revival buildings. There is a difference between the buildings in Tryavna and the ones in Plovdiv, Arbanasi, parts of Veliko Tarnovo and elsewhere, however; the roofs are tiled with slate rather than terra cotta. Not slate tiles as we know it, either, but big, hefty, uneven slabs of it.

The first place we went to was the Church of Archangel Michael, deliciously cool inside and a feast for our eyes as well. As you might expect in a centre for woodcarving, the iconostasis and pulpit were wonderfully carved. The dark wood contrasted well with the colourful icons.

The church is on the corner of the main square; a very distinctive clock tower stands on another side of it. I remembered this from last time. We asked if people can climb up it, but unfortunately it's closed off to visitors at the moment.

Instead of that, we popped into a sweetshop next door - Tryavna has many of these, selling things such as Bulgarian delight, sheets of sesame snap and colourful curly lollies which look like rock.

After making some purchases (I got some sesame snap) we moved next door to the Old School Museum. We went under a stone archway and emerged into a small but wonderfully atmospheric courtyard. The school was built in 1839 and is similar to a house, with only one room actually a classroom. On the ground floor were craftsmen's workshops and on the first floor were the classroom, canteen and rooms for teachers, guardians and pupils from mountain villages. The school was the first secular one in Tryavna.

The ground floor rooms weren't part of the museum and were closed, but upstairs I looked at an exhibition of colourful paintings and wooden sculptures of people done in the primitive style by the contemporary Bulgarian artists Nikola and Dimitar Kazakov, the old classroom, an exhibition of timepieces imported by 19th century Tryavna families (it included an 'reverse handed' clock - one where the numbers went anti-clockwise) and an exhibition of 19th century school textbooks and student reports.

The latter exhibition didn't have any English text accompanying them, unfortunately, but it was still interesting to look at. One of these reports was actually from a school in Bucharest and was written in both Romanian and Latin - I liked comparing the two and seeing how similar the languages are.

The classroom was interesting too because it was set up how it was in the 19th century. The front row was for infants and had little sand boxes for them to outline words and letters in; the second row had slates and was where the infants moved to after a year of sitting at the front. The third and fourth rows had inkpots; students only moved there once they were trusted to be able to write with pen and paper. An old-fashioned version of the Cyrillic alphabet was on the wall.

After the school museum we walked on to the same café I'd had hot sand coffee at with F in January. It was too hot for coffee this time, so a cold drink was in order.

From there we walked on to the 'Fountain of Love', something I'd seen back in January but hadn't known the background. It's very small, but has a beautiful carving of a woman; apparently whoever drinks from it will have a happy and long-lasting marriage. Both 'S' and I drank from it!

The fountain was opposite Daskalov House, the beautiful house museum with the carved suns in the roof that I had been to back in January. I had a sit down and admired the sculpture outside while the others went in.

Another drink at a another café followed, before we left Tryavna and went on to Bozhentsi, a small village about five km away as the crow flies but actually about 20 km to drive due to the roundabout route you have to take through the hills.

Some general photos of Tryavna:

I'll write properly tomorrow - for now, just a quick entry with some photos of the public art I have seen around Veliko Tarnovo. My favourites are the jellyfish electrical box and the steps whales!

Our day trip today was to the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Old Nessebar, which lies half an hour away by bus from Burgas on a tiny peninsula joined to the mainland by a narrow man-made isthmus. It is stuffed full of historic ruins and buildings, including Ancient Greek ruins, early Christian and medieval churches and fine wooden houses built in the coastal version of the Bulgarian National Revival style.

We wandered around for a long time, enjoying the sunshine, architecture, cobbled streets and the white and light blue fishing boats in the harbour. Swallows flitted from building to building; a cockerel crowed down to us from someone's bedroom window.

We came across lots and lots of old churches; some in ruins, some not ruined but locked and some neither ruined nor locked. Most of them had a distinctive green ceramic pattern running in a line across the archways above the doors and windows. The big ruined church of Sveta Sofia was impressive, as was the smaller church of Christ Pantocrator, which is now a small art gallery. I went in and looked round an interesting exhibition of facsimiles of historic maps of Bulgaria, the Balkans and the Black Sea coast (focussing on Nessebar).

The church of Sveti Stefan, which was last up, had a spectacular interior. For once I was allowed to take photos (though still without flash), so I took full advantage. The frescoes were amazing.

By the time I came out of Sveti Stefan, the sunshine had disappeared. We walked back to the old town walls, looked at the bus times and realised we didn't have time to go into the Archaeology Museum - a shame. As we looked out over the bay, we saw clouds and rain envelop Sunny Beach and then sweep towards us... The downpour hit us suddenly, with thunder, lightning and an absolute deluge of rain. I managed to get a good photo of a lightning strike, before running for the cover of the bus shelter.

Before too long the bus came to take us back to Burgas.

Day trip to the historic town of Sozopol today.

For our free breakfast we had to walk down the road for 30 seconds to Hotel Fors, which is in partnership with our guesthouse. We took our pick from the buffet of cucumber, salami, scrambled eggs, frankfurter pieces, boiled eggs, mini croissants, cheese slices, slices of cake, jam, fruit juice and hot drinks; then we headed straight off to the south bus station. I had been told that all buses to coastal destinations leave from here. It was only five minutes' walk. Once we got there, however, a large construction site was where the station should have been. Ah. I suddenly realised why the bus had taken us to a different bus station yesterday. Just to confirm my suspicion, in Bulgarian I asked the lady at the nearby ferry service hut where we should get the bus to Sozopol. "Avtogara Zapad" she said. That's the west bus station. Suspicions confirmed!

A short taxi ride later we arrived at the west bus station. The driver asked us if we wanted to pay him 30 leva to take us to Sozopol - no thank you was the answer, as I happened to know that a bus ticket there only costs 4.50! At the station, first of all the lady at the ticket desk helpfully said we had to pay the driver, not her; then the kindly lady at the snack kiosk gave me a short impromptu lesson on the exact pronunciation of the Bulgarian word for a specific type of flattened chocolate doughnut! We finally boarded the bus ten minutes before it set off.

We arrived in Sozopol thirty to forty minutes later and immediately began walking around. It was a beautiful day. We saw fascinating old wooden buildings, of a type neither Dave or I had seen before, and lots of old stone buildings with terracotta tiled roofs. We passed at least two street stalls selling fig jam, but neither of us bought any.

After a lovely wander around the cobbled streets, we came across a place I had heard about and was keen to visit; the church of Sveta Bogoroditsa. Like all churches built during the Ottoman period, it was wasn't allowed to be higher than a mosque, so it was built partly below ground level; when we entered the purple flower-filled courtyard we had to go down some steps to reach the entrance.

It was small but wonderful inside. Nearly everything was wooden! Even the pillars were made of wood; I could still see the marks of the plane. The ceiling was wooden and the iconostasis and pulpit were made of fantastically carved, darker wood. I loved the contrast between the darkness of the wood and the vivid colours of the icons. I bought and lit a candle before leaving. Unfortunately there was no chance of taking any photos of the interior because the woman at the candle/ icon card stall inside the church would have seen me.

From there we walked on to Sveti Georgi church; today is the Bulgarian St George's Day, a big deal in Bulgaria, so I thought there might be something special going on there in celebration. It was lunchtime, however, and I noticed a sign saying that it didn't re-open until 2pm, so we went off to search out some lunch instead.

Lunch was at an Italian restaurant. The pizza was simple but absolutely fantastic - mine was definitely one of the best I've ever had. We also shared a tasty tuna salad and some garlic bread.

By the time we finished lunch it was past two o'clock, so after buying postcards, we headed back to Sveti Georgi. This church was built in the 19th century, so although there was a lovely picture of St George & the Dragon over the entrance, the interior looked newer than that of Sveta Bogoroditsa, and wasn't quite as atmospheric. I didn't notice any signs of celebrations apart from some tulips which had been placed in front of a big icon of St George. The other icons didn't have them.

Next to the church of Sveti Georgi were the remains of another church. Not much left now though apart from a few arches and wall foundations.

The beach was our next destination. It was very pleasant, with a great view of the Old Town of Sozopol on the headland on our left. Like in Varna, the sea was very clear but also very cold! Dave swam but I just paddled. I went beachcombing but didn't see much apart from purple and white mussel shells.

From the beach we wandered back to the Old Town, where we were due to catch the 17.30 bus back to Burgas. We had a little bit of time to kill until then, so we walked over to a shop with an ice cream cabinet outside the front with jars of fig jam on top. Dave almost bought a jar but then backed out. An ice cream kept me going until the bus arrived.