In the distance we could see the old town, looming on a cliff above us. Our taxi circled the perimeter of the town, choosing streets to turn down, only to arrive at a dead-end or a one-way. On much more than one occasion, the city map was consulted by our driver, while he mumbled in Bulgarian, trying to find a way to penetrate the ancient walls.
Eventually we gave up and chose to walk, rather than drive. The taxi chauffeur felt awful for not being able to get us to our destination, and he didn’t charge us the price on the meter. However, we still chose to give him some money, but the gesture was indicative of what we would experience during the next 5 nights in Plovdiv.
We’ve arrived! crossing the border from Turkey into Bulgaria was very straightforward
We hoofed it up steep cobblestone streets, which was made simpler by the fact that we had no luggage. The airline had lost it en route to Turkey – maybe it was in Puerto Rico where we started our journey, possibly our layover city of new York, or maybe it was in Istanbul?
Who knew, all we knew was that at that moment, we were pleased to only have our day packs.
The little lanes zigged and zagged in all directions, and the high walls made it challenging to see anything up ahead. Seeing our confused faces, a man came over and helped us find our hostel. In fact, he actually walked us best to the door.
From the outside, the Hostel Old Plovdiv was stunning, with its yellow exterior, ornate wooden columns, and beautifully decorated facade.
As we entered the 150 year old home, we were in awe of the high ceilings and wooden floors. greeting us was a welcome sign! In all of our years of backpacking around the world, never has a hostel had a personal sign for its visitors – a very good touch indeed.
The beautiful Hostel Old Plovdiv – we couldn’t get over the customized sign!
Even though this accommodation is considered a hostel, it’s much more like a boutique hotel (which we love), and the prices are incredibly fair (10 Euros / person / night, including a substantial breakfast).
Originally owned by a rich tobacco farmer, this home is somewhat of a museum. While numerous of the homes from this period have been converted into shops or restaurants, Hostel Old Plovdiv provides guests a peek of what households were like in the 1800’s.
The elegant ceilings and antique furniture is lovely, but what really amazed us was the stone wall from the Roman period in the basement!
A portion of a Roman wall in the basement of the hostel!
There’s just something about old towns that we’ve always been drawn to, and Plovdiv’s was no exception. just steps from the hostel we could visit a museum, church, art gallery, Roman ruins, and the Rahat Tepe tavern – which we ended up frequenting quite often!
A short walk brought us to the main pedestrian street, which is a feature that all cities ought to have. Knyaz Aleksandar I is the longest pedestrianized street in all of Europe, spanning 1.7 kilometers.
A portion of the pedestrian street in Plovdiv
This was an outstanding spot for shopping, people watching, having coffee, and checking out the 240 meter long Roman stadium, which has been partially excavated.
As Canadians, seeing ruins from the Roman period in the basement of our hostel, scattered along a ridge of the old town, and in the center of the city was pretty incredible.
In Canada, the oldest structure we have is from the early 1600’s, while the country of Canada itself wasn’t founded until 1867!
The partially excavated Roman stadium best in the middle of the pedestrian street!
We joined a totally free walking trip with some other backpackers which was a terrific way to get our bearings in the city. We delighted in the Bulgarian revival architecture, the up-and-coming neighbourhood “the Trap”, and seeing the amazing Roman amphitheater, which is actually still used for various performances.
Revival style architecture on the walking tour
The surrounding countryside has 40 wineries with local varieties of grapes, which only grow in Bulgaria. even though we took a red wine trip during a cold January day, it was still stunning, and I can’t even think of how stunning the vineyards should be in the spring and summer.
The Thracian people (you’ve probably heard of Spartacus?) were from Thrace, an area found in present day Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey. They were outstanding red wine makers and it’s said that the first vines in Europe were brought by Thracians from the middle east and planted in what is now southern Bulgaria.
The first winery on our trip was StarataIzba Parvenets, with a beautiful 19th century estate draped in vines. We sampled red wine straight from the Bulgarian oak barrels in a 130 year old cellar! This was one of those “I can’t believe what we’re doing” moments in travel.
At the entrance to the Starata Izba Parvenets Winery, gorgeous!
The second, and final, winery we had a look at was the much more modern vacation home Yustina, set on a beautiful property. We Goats were able to get a sneak peek into the goat pen – they were so cute! We also sampled a broad variety of wines which were grown, aged and bottled best on the estate.
Even though we really delighted in the goats and wines on offer here, we loved the fact that we were able to experience wine pairings with food.
Goats!!
A platter of cheese, meats, bread and blueberry jam was available for us to eat – which was good, as we had about 6 tastings by this point (and the “tastings” were much more like full sized glasses).
The wineries were completely different from one another, and we had a distinct and outstanding experience at both of them.
Krassi pouring us some tasty red wine to pair with our appetizers
Plovdiv checked off all of the boxes when it concerns what we look for in a destination. There was fantastic history, terrific food, stunning scenery, fascinating architecture and the people were extremely friendly and welcoming. We actually became pals with the owners of Bulgaria red wine trips (Vasil and Zina). They even took us out on a bit of a pub crawl!
Us with Vasil of Bulgaria red wine trips – thanks for a terrific day!
Everyone else we encountered was genuine and didn’t treat us like foreigners or tourists. We felt like pals with so numerous people in this city. We were also randomly interviewed by a journalist at one of the pubs, check it out here.
The restaurants were outstanding and we loved sampling the local Bulgarian food (Nick has discovered he really likes duck heart!) For entertainment, the pubs were a lot of fun, and thanks to our pal Jazza, we were able to find some amazing live music as well… in the basement of a bar.
The live music was awesome!
The history was mind-blowing, our accommodation was amazing and the overall vibe of the city was very “aylak” (the Plovdiv word for relaxed). This is somewhere we would love to return to in the spring, and it comes as no surprise to us that Plovdiv has been noted as the European capital of culture in 2019.
On top of all of this, the cost of travelling in Plovdiv was of a very good value. In a restaurant, meals were between $3 – $5 for a large plate of food, local beers were around $1 and .5L of red wine was $2.50. Taxis were also very economical (they actually use the meter!), and the cover charge for the live music was $1.
There was something about Plovdiv that made us want to linger. This was the first stop on our Eastern Europe backpacking trip, and we quickly wanted to stay put! But, we needed to keep moving and explore more. stay tuned for our upcoming adventures in this part of the world.
Photo by: Jazza of NOMADasaurus
Check out our quick video of our time in Plovdiv ?
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A big thank-you to Hostel Old Plovdiv and Bulgaria red wine trips for hosting us during our stay in the city, we had a terrific time! As always, all thoughts and opinions remain our own, despite any complimentary services received.
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