Our honeymoon was eventful..... And not in newly wed type way!
We landed in Sofia, after some waiting got our hire car and, with me driving, we set off..... With me chanting 'I must be in the middle of the road' to remind myself which side to drive
We drove for a few hours taking in the lovely sights before arriving at the place we booked to stay for that night; in a village near VT. We found it on Airbnb and on paper it looked perfect. In reality it was awful. We were greeted by a man who was a friend of the owner (it turns out he went to stay for a few days many years ago and never left!). He made us a cup of tea and told us all about the salvage hunting he did for a living. If we ever needed ANYTHING he could get it !
The tea mugs were filthy and the tea didn't taste quite right, sound have guessed then that the room wouldn't be great! To be fair , he was nice and friendly, just a little too dodgy for our liking.
He said he has 'upgraded' us from a private room in the hostel (we had no idea it was a hostel until then!) to the private bungalow because it had a wood burner and the rooms had no heating.
Well we managed about 10 mins in the bungalow before asking Google to find as a hotel with vacancies nearby!
It smelt dirty, it was dirty, there was mould on the ceiling, the window was broken so wouldn't close, it was just manky. Even if it wasn't the first night of our honeymoon we wouldn't of stayed there.
We later spoke to a friend who lives near VT and discovered it didn't have a good reputation and that a lot of young girls seem to spend time there.
The tea mugs were filthy and the tea didn't taste quite right, sound have guessed then that the room wouldn't be great! To be fair , he was nice and friendly, just a little too dodgy for our liking.
He said he has 'upgraded' us from a private room in the hostel (we had no idea it was a hostel until then!) to the private bungalow because it had a wood burner and the rooms had no heating.
Well we managed about 10 mins in the bungalow before asking Google to find as a hotel with vacancies nearby!
It smelt dirty, it was dirty, there was mould on the ceiling, the window was broken so wouldn't close, it was just manky. Even if it wasn't the first night of our honeymoon we wouldn't of stayed there.
We later spoke to a friend who lives near VT and discovered it didn't have a good reputation and that a lot of young girls seem to spend time there.
Anyway we found a cheap but nice looking hotel on Google so put it in the sat nav and set off. For those of you already in Bulgaria you will know that sat navs aren't that good over there. We drove round and round and round VT for over an hour trying to find the hotel. Bear in mind we had been up for about 19 hours and I had already driven for 3 hours on Bulgarian roads. We were stressed!
In the end we parked (I think illegally but I was past caring!) and decided to find the hotel on foot. A Bulgarian man decided to try to befriend us to get money. Now I am a hardened traveler who is used to this and am very capable of telling them where to shove it (how nicely I tell them depends on how much they are harassing me!!). Matt however isn't well travelled (this was only his second trip abroad) so decided to stop for a chat despite me trying to drag him away. He is too nice for his own good most of the time! So there was me ranting under my breath about wasting time talking to some bloke who just wanted our money when Matt told him we were trying to find the hotel so he walked us to the door, told us how to drive from where we had parked (dumped!) the car and then asked for £1. OK, OK I am happy to admit when I am wrong. He wasn't so bad after all! In fact he saved the day. We didn't have much change on us but we gave him all of it..... He might of thought he scammed us but I think we did better out of the deal!
We checked in, opened all the windows (to them it was winter so the heating was on full. It was 20 degees outside and about 40 in our room!) and went to a restaurant recommended by reception. It was our first meal in Bulgaria and it was amazing. You get a lot for your money in restaurants!
In the end we parked (I think illegally but I was past caring!) and decided to find the hotel on foot. A Bulgarian man decided to try to befriend us to get money. Now I am a hardened traveler who is used to this and am very capable of telling them where to shove it (how nicely I tell them depends on how much they are harassing me!!). Matt however isn't well travelled (this was only his second trip abroad) so decided to stop for a chat despite me trying to drag him away. He is too nice for his own good most of the time! So there was me ranting under my breath about wasting time talking to some bloke who just wanted our money when Matt told him we were trying to find the hotel so he walked us to the door, told us how to drive from where we had parked (dumped!) the car and then asked for £1. OK, OK I am happy to admit when I am wrong. He wasn't so bad after all! In fact he saved the day. We didn't have much change on us but we gave him all of it..... He might of thought he scammed us but I think we did better out of the deal!
We checked in, opened all the windows (to them it was winter so the heating was on full. It was 20 degees outside and about 40 in our room!) and went to a restaurant recommended by reception. It was our first meal in Bulgaria and it was amazing. You get a lot for your money in restaurants!
As you can imagine it was an early night for us. We were absolutely exhausted.
Enough for one post i think. More to follow soon x
Sounds like you had an interesting start to your trip. Sat navs over here have a mind of there own. Mine often sends me down the most potholed dirt tracks next to the perfectly good bit of tarmac that goes to the same place just because it is 2 foot shorter.
ReplyDeleteLook forward to further updates.