Bulgaria: Plovdiv for Our Anniversary

To celebrate 25 years of marriage, go to a city with history and beauty - and without crowds and stag parties, author Katie Wood writes about Bulgaria's Plovdiv in The Times Travel Section. Photo by Sofia Photo Agency

Katie Wood

The Times

September 26, 2009

Eyebrows were raised when we said we were heading to Plovdiv, rather than Paris or Venice, to celebrate the quarter century. But we wanted somewhere different and felt that Bulgaria's second city might surprise us.

Plovdiv is proud of its status as the nation's cultural capital. It is the type of place that, clichéd as it sounds, has to be seen now - within a decade it will be another Cracow or Prague, teeming with tourists and stag weekends.

At the moment it's free of both, and you will have an experience that is charming and sometimes challenging. Few locals speak English and the infrastructure for tourism barely exists, but you will find history and folklore, and see a side of life that is fast disappearing in Europe.

Never mind a hop-on, hop-off bus tour, in Plovdiv there are none. Get out of the city and you will find the main mode of transport is still the donkey. Potholes the size of lunar craters, and one shepherd for every dozen sheep - it's hard to grasp that you're still in the EU, though the EC logos on conservation and road projects are reminders.

The city oozes history. The Thracians were its first settlers 7,000 years ago, followed in the 4th century BC by Philip of Macedon, father of Alexander the Great, who renamed the city Philippopolis.

The Romans made Plovdiv their home in the 1st century AD and there are still abundant reminders of their occupation. The Antique Theatre, one of the most famous monuments in Bulgaria, was unearthed in the 1970s.

It was built in the beginning of the 2nd century and seated 3,500 people. Another is the Roman Odeon. It was built between the 2nd and 5th centuries and, again, is remarkably intact.

Impressive as the Roman buildings are, the colourful old merchant houses of Plovdiv are the real highlight of the city. Clustered together in the hilly old town, these buildings date from the 18th and 19th centuries.

No fewer than 200 houses here have been declared Unesco monuments of culture. Argir Kuyumdzhioglu House, built in 1847, is a Baroque-style beauty. A four-storey house of 12 rooms with a large garden and marble fountain, it has elaborately carved wooden ceilings and elegant ornamental niches.

Balabanov House is another fine example, as is Stepan Hindlian House, built in 1835, which has opulent decor and a still-functioning Turkish hammam.

In the Church of St Constantine and St Elena we found ourselves breaking bread with a little girl having her first Holy Communion.

The grandmother invited us to share the traditional brioche eaten on this occasion, and our translator told us that to have "foreign strangers" at the celebration brings the child luck. A nice moment, and one I doubt you would find in Prague these days.

Wine is important in Bulgaria and has a history dating back to Thracian times, so we spent a couple of days at the nearby winery of Starosel. At £35 for a large, comfortable double room it was a bargain.

The biggest thrill was finding that Starosel was next to Thracian temples and tombs that date back to the 4th century BC. They were discovered only in 2000 and excavation is continuing.

But what is visible already makes for an impressive visit. The surrounding hills are studded with more Thracian remains, and a 4x4 safari was a great way to explore the area. Plovdiv seems like the "Wild East" of Europe, and it's a frontier worth getting to know now, while you can enjoy it by yourself.

 

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