11 May 2018, Friday
After a blissful night’s rest, we woke up bright and early to clear blue skies and 12 degrees Celsius weather. It was a beautiful morning. We had our breakfast before checking out of the apartment at about 8am. Initially, we encountered some difficulties flagging a taxi but thankfully, we managed to find one that was willing to take us to the bus station. The short taxi ride cost 3.23 lev (S$2.70).
I had pre-booked our tickets to Sofia via the Bus Express website (click here). The tickets cost 10.29 lev (S$8.77) per person for the 1 hour 45 min ride. It was a basic, air-conditioned bus with no frills but it was comfortable enough. At 9:12am, we departed Blagoevgrad and headed north towards Bulgaria’s capital city.
The ride was uneventful and we arrived at Sofia’s Central Bus Station at 10:54am. As it was way too early to check in to our Airbnb apartment, we took our time to have a meal at the food court on the second floor of the bus terminal. We also exchanged more Bulgarian lev at the money changer located inside the bus terminal.
After that, we went to the Matpu (click here) office to buy our tickets for tomorrow’s bus ride to Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. Matpu (Матпу in Cyrillic) is a Bulgarian bus company offering services to neighbouring countries including Serbia and Turkey.
Do note that the Matpu office is not housed in the same building as the Central Bus Station. It is located on the ground floor of a two-storey building across the open-air carpark, along the same main road, bulevard Knyaginya Maria Luiza. The Matpu office occupies one of the units along the row of bus/tour companies, facing the bus park.
There is no direct bus from Sofia to Belgrade. A change of buses at Niš in Serbia is required and the onward journey will be on a different bus company – Niš-Ekspres, which is a Serbian company. However, at the Matpu office in Sofia, we were able to buy tickets for both legs of the journey. The Sofia – Niš leg (on Matpu) costs 24 lev, and the Niš – Belgrade journey (on Niš-Ekspres) costs 22 lev, so it came up to 46 lev (S$38.41) altogether for the 7.5-hour ride.
After securing our bus tickets, we proceeded to our Airbnb apartment, about 650m away. I chose the apartment because of its location near Central Bus Station. With our luggage in tow, it took us less than 20 minutes to walk there, arriving at about 12:20pm. The cleaner was still tidying up the apartment, so we just dropped out suitcases and headed out again.
Airbnb apartment
Address: ulitsa “Kozloduy” 87 floor 5, ap# 13, Sofia, Sofia City Province 1202
Host: Slavka
Price: S$97.43 for 3 pax for 1 night
Link: https://www.airbnb.com.sg/rooms/22240723?s=51
From our apartment, it was only a 5-minute walk to Lions’ Bridge. This venerated bridge was constructed in 1891 and designed by Czech architect Václav Prošek. It runs across the Vladaya River and it is at the intersection of the busy Maria Luiza boulevard and Slivnitsa boulevard. The bridge got its name from the four bronze lion sculptures guarding the entrances.
After crossing Lions’ Bridge, we walked south along Maria Luiza boulevard and approached the city centre. Along the way, we passed by Banya Bashi Mosque, built in Ottoman architectural style and completed in 1576. Its name means ‘many baths’, as the mosque was actually built over natural thermal spas. You can recognise the mosque by its large dome and minaret.
The more we walked, it quickly became apparent that Sofia is very different from Blagoevgrad. As Bulgaria’s capital city, Sofia is much more vibrant and crowded, like a typical European city. There were lots of cars on the roads, a tram line that runs through the city centre, international brands like McDonald’s and H&M, and the locals speak more English here.
Our first objective was to visit the Saint Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, Sofia’s primary tourist attraction. The cathedral was completed in 1912 and it is named after a Russian prince. In case you’re wondering why Bulgaria’s most important cathedral is named after a Russian prince, here’s a very quick history lesson.
Bulgaria and Russia have ties stretching back centuries. They both share the use of the Cyrillic alphabet and they call their monarchs tsars, a Slavic word for caesar or emperor. Bulgaria and Russia are two of the 13 Slavic countries. The Ottomans conquered Bulgaria for about 500 years and Russia helped Bulgaria gain sovereignty from the Ottoman Empire in 1878. Bulgaria then built an Orthodox church in Sofia and named it after the Russian saint Alexander Nevsky in honour of the Russian soldiers who helped Bulgaria during the war.
The Alexander Nevsky Cathedral was the largest cathedral we had encountered during this trip so far and it was an eye-opener. I was impressed by its beautiful gold domes, copper green roofs and white walls. Its interior was equally impressive, with elaborate frescoes covering every inch of the walls and grand chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. Photography is not allowed inside so I don’t have any pictures to show you. It is well worth a visit if you ever go to Sofia.
Tip: The best angle to photograph Alexander Nevsky Cathedral is not from the front (where the main entrance is) but rather, from the side or the back, where you can see the many different levelled domes. From the front, the cathedral appears one-dimensional.
Located nearby is another Orthodox church, the Church of St. Nicholas the Miracle-Maker or Church Sveti Nikolay Mirlikiiski, or simply, the Russian Church. It is much smaller than the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral but its design is more characteristic of the Russian Orthodox churches, with its distinctive gold onion bulb domes.
We then walked towards Vitosha boulevard, the main commercial area of Sofia. It is a pedestrian shopping street with plenty of shops and restaurants and this is where most tourists and locals hang out.
We didn’t do a lot in Sofia and took it really easy. After window-shopping for a while, we went to the Billa supermarket to get our (budget) dinner and went back to our apartment to rest and have an early night. On our way back, we stumbled upon some sort of local market, a nice cobblestoned street with many stalls selling vegetables and fruits.
11 days into our trip, we were feeling a little tired from the travelling. This was our third city in three days, i.e. the third night of sleeping in a different bed. But this was always the plan – Bulgaria was more of an ‘along-the-way’ destination from Greece to Hungary so I didn’t plan to devote much time here. I’m sure there is much more to explore in Bulgaria and we didn’t get to see everything this time round. Which makes it the perfect opportunity to come back again in the future!
