Ruse

Ruse was our last stop on Monday.  Everyone else had already seen it except me but it's apparently known as "Little Vienna" because of it's beautiful European architecture and vistas along the Danube so we decided to stop for the night and enjoy an evening of exploring.

Did we stay somewhere beautiful?  Bright at least :)

And it really was gorgeous.  I didn't take too many pictures but the architecture was breathtaking and very distinct from what we saw in the rest of Bulgaria.

Sunset over the Danube?  Count me in.

Ivanovo Rock Monasteries

We headed out of Veliko Tarnovo in the early afternoon so we'd have time to stop at these rock monasteries.  The main sites Taylor and his parents had seen when they went to visit after his mission but I was able to find all sorts of small but amazing sites all on pinterest.  Who knew?

These rock monasteries were one of those.  Why are they called "rock monasteries" you ask?  Because they're literally carved INTO the rocks.  During the Ottoman Empire's rule of Bulgaria from 1400 to almost 1900AD, the christian churches were allowed to continue running as long as the priests agreed to collect taxes from the people and pay them as tribute to the Ottomans.  Those who refused were killed.  So many of them fled and went into hiding.  They found that the rock layers in this part of Bulgaria are softer than most and could be chipped away at to form man-made caves.

See how high up they were though?  Yikes!

Here's the zoomed in shot.

So off we headed on our walk through the woods... since we're not that good at rock climbing.

We walked...

And walked...

And finally came around the corner to a very tight entrance.

Back in the day the entrances were hidden better and much harder to find.

And once the monks were inside and living safely, with not much to do, they decided to paint frescos which are amazingly well preserved and just, well, amazing!  It's like being in the Sistene chapel with a really short ceiling.

Here I've sacrificed my dignity (and black pants) and lay on the dusty stone floor and take this picture of the ceiling.

They really were just unique and fascinating.

And sadly, affected by natural forces of rock movement and weathering.

This entire chunk of the ceiling fell off and the painting is in half.

Then it was time for a long trek back down and Taylor's turn to document that I was actually there.

Veliko Tarnovo

Sunday after our long, beautiful drive we arrived in Veliko Tarnovo.  It was pitch black and we had a true adventure trying to find our little boutique hotel.  The GPS kept telling us to just turn right even though there were just rows and rows of houses to the right.  So finally we just picked a street to the right and took it... and drove down and down and down while the road got tighter and tighter and tighter.  Seriously at several points I could have reached out the window and touched the houses and Taylor could have done the same.  It was insane.  And pitch black.  Finally after some fancy maneuvering from Taylor we were headed back up and finally onto a main road.  After almost an hour we finally found the right tiny one way road and our hotel.  Did I mention these are all cobblestone roads with lots of potholes?  And sheer drop offs on some sides???

In the morning this is what our hotel looked like.

And we were supposed to have these amazing views from our balconies, but instead all we could see was the fog.

Still kind of a fun place to wake up in and the little restaurant attached to the hotel was amazing.

Taylor's mom really wanted to see what a school in Bulgaria was like so she'd contacted the local high school and asked for a tour.  Taylor stayed with her to help with translating but since neither Jeff nor I wanted to waste our 1 day in the city listening to translations, we set off to see the old fort and castle in town.  

Veliko Tarnovo is the Old Bulgarian Capital.  It dates back to 300 BC and was the strongest fortress in the country until the Ottomans took it in the 14th century,  It's easy to see why it was so defensible- the river literally turns in a triangle shape around this very high mountain creating a naturally small entrance on one side and 3 steep cliffs on the others.

Sadly much of the city has been left to disrepair and is only now being excavated and preserved and rebuilt in some areas.

It was really neat to be allowed to walk wherever we wanted and see what life would have been like back then.

It was also really neat to have Jeff there because he's so knowledgable about history.  You can see 2 other mountains off int he distance and he explained how you can see the exposed rock there.  It was too costly in manpower to move stone very far so usually they'd pick a tall hill or mountain and then just carve away the rock on the top to use to fortify building around the lower areas.  So most castles have huge caverns under them where they dug out the rock.  Here they just left the exposed rock that was naturally there and then added to it with rock in the center of the hill.  That also helped flatten the center so homes and buildings, churches and castles could be built within the walls.

The Veliko Tarnovo castle hasn't been rebuilt but the church has in a smaller version.  It's of course the highest point.

And the views from the top are just spectacular.  You can see the river on both the left and a bit on the right with just that small strip of land they had to defend as an entrance.  The river literally goes right around this whole hill fortress.  And modern Veliko Tarnovo is in the distance.

Inside, instead of creating a replica of an old cathedral, they've used modern artists to draw.  The cathedrals we saw were all amazingly ornate but this was just fascinating because of the modern take on the same bible stories.  And they let us take pictures which was rare.

Some of the foundations and buildings have been rebuilt around the castle and the area really was huge which almost 15,000 people living inside at one time.

I'm sure it was more impressive in the day but this was an amazing way to spend the morning.

After the castle we walked back across and into town and saw more fortresses...

More churches...

More statues (of random people of course)...

An active excavation site...

And then we drove back to pick up Taylor and Sonia.  The streets are intensely narrow here.

And just for fun, we drove back on the roads we'd driven in the dark the night before.  See how tight?

And we went back by our hotel to see what we'd missed with the fog.  Apparently a huge valley with a giant church and monuments.

And an amazing view of this city built on hillsides.

Back In Utah

Meanwhile back in Utah my kids were thoroughly entertained by my mother and grandparents who came up to join them for church.  Sadly we planned our trip in the spring and then it turned out we'd be gone on the Sunday of the kid's primary program.  Luckily there was plenty of my family to come support them and my visiting teacher even agreed to sit with Miles on the stand since he and a few of the other sunbeams were being "rowdy" during practice and were required to have a parent sitting with them.  Classic!

After church they did some sightseeing of their own, even with the greats needing walkers.

And my mom couldn't resist sending us a picture of this cutie.

And the hairdo she did for her.  Cute!

Sunday travels

Saturday night we had an amazing meal of local fare thanks to Taylor's translating skills and then we were off to bed to get over some of the jet lag still hanging around.

Sunday morning we all walked to church.  Luckily there are a fair number of American embassy workers who are mormon too so there was english translation.  Taylor was in heaven being back in his old stomping ground.  He served almost half his mission in the city and was excited to see the progress.  Sadly for him, the church has actually declined.  Not because of people going inactive, but when Bulgaria joined the EU in 2007 a majority of the members took the opportunity to go to other countries where they could find better jobs.  You can't blame them but it set the church back almost 20 years in Bulgaria.  So there weren't many members to reminisce with but it was still fun to be there.  Sadly I forgot to take any pictures of the actual church or people he did know.  

This is one of the apartments he lived in.

After church we started our drive to the next city.  But since Taylor had picked the cities we were going to and then I went a little crazy with guide books and pinterest planning where to go, we had to make one cool pitstop.  The Devatashka Cave.  Looks huge from a 1/2 mile away right?

Apparently it's full of all kinds of species of bats.

Luckily we didn't see any.

The amazing part of this cave is that it's got these huge, gaping holes all over the place and the walls and ceilings are hundreds of feet tall.

Just breathtaking.

And in case you needed more history, these are footprints from old fuel silos the communists hid from satelites by hiding them in the cave.

After a quick stop at the cave, it was more driving through the lovely countryside.  Bulgaria is much like Utah in climate and geography except that none of it's desert.

Nothing like a long Sunday drive anywhere in the world.