After an incredible few weeks in Turkey, we hopped in a taxi to take us to the train station. Our ride out of Istanbul was via the Sofia Express, an overnight train that was an original section of the infamous Orient Express. Trains are by far my favorite mode of transportation and I was already so excited to ride on such an iconic train, but my expectations were far surpassed when we arrived in our cabin!
For just 30 euros/person, the two of us had a private little room! One side of the room had seats that folded down into a bunk bed, and the other side had a mini fridge with provided snacks, a counter, a sink with a mirror, a shelf for luggage, and hangers. The bathroom was out in the hall but maintained very well and kept clean.
We boarded the train around 8 pm and settled in for the night. It would be approx. a 12-hour journey to Sofia, Bulgaria, and due to Turkey not being in the EU, we would unfortunately have to be woken up to pass through border patrol in the middle of the night.
We got cozy, put on a movie, and tried to get some sleep before the border crossing. Around 2 am, we were woken up by a train employee telling everyone to wake up, grab their passports, and disembark. We had arrived at the Turkish border and had to line up to get stamped out of Turkey. We were towards the beginning of the line, so luckily we only had to wait for about 25 minutes before we could re-embark on the train and go back to bed.
Unfortunately, we didn’t realize that we also needed to stamp into Bulgaria at a different border crossing a few miles down the road, so we were woken up yet again by a Bulgarian border patrol officer asking us to hand in our passports. Luckily, we didn’t actually need to disembark this time, and the border patrol officer just took our passports to be processed while we stayed in bed. After about an hour, our passports were returned and the train pulled out of the station.
We were so tired from all the middle of the night wakeup calls, that we completely passed out for the rest of the night. The cabin was so cozy and the beds were actually really comfortable, so we both slept really well. I woke up around 11 am and had a mild panic attack that we had slept through our stop. Luckily, our train was just late into Sofia due to the hours spent at the border crossings, and we had woken up just 5 minutes before we pulled into the station. We quickly packed up our cabin, grabbed our bags, and got off the train.
Our Airbnb host allowed us an early check-in, so we called a taxi to our Airbnb and settled in. The Airbnb was actually much larger and cuter than we expected – a positive catfish! We were in Sofia to meet up with our BFF from Taiwan, Michele aka Miffy, where we would spend the next 2 weeks travelling together through the Balkans.
We went out for a walk of our neighbourhood, and hit up the grocery store nearby to stock the fridge, and Michele arrived just as we returned. We spent the whole evening catching up and brainstorming the next steps for our trip.
The next morning, we set out to explore the city. First impressions? Sofia was a bit odd… It was relatively deserted, covered in graffiti, and didn’t seem to offer many obvious activities.
We strolled through a local park and came across several statues scattered in the city’s parks. Unlike other major cities that we had been to, Sofia didn’t seem to have a “city centre” to explore, so we sat on a park bench trying to research where to head next.
Most of the recommendations we found for “things to do in Sofia” were actually day trips that would take us out of the city, but one of the local activities that caught our attention was a visit to the Museum of Illusions, so we decided to head there.
While making our way, we stumbled upon some historical ruins known as Serdica. These ruins were discovered during the excavation for a new metro line back in 2010. We decided to explore them, but compared to other ruins we had seen, some of the bricks seemed a little too….new. It looked like some of the ruins were actually old, but had been repaired with a strange mix of old and new bricks. We couldn’t figure out whether the newer bricks had been added after the discovery or were part of the original ruins.
Our visit to the Museum of Illusions actually turned out to be a really fun and cute experience. The museum was highly interactive, and there were plenty of hands-on activities. It wasn’t too crowded, so we had lots of time to enjoy each exhibit. Each station had a different optical illusion, hologram, light show, or 3D artwork that challenged our perceptions. It was a great way to kill a few hours in the afternoon.
On the way home, we decided to stop by a local bar called the Thirsty Dragon which was recommended by my Bulgarian former manager, Milena. The bar was so cute, with ivy growing up the side of the building and a really cute courtyard with outdoor seating.
Milena had recommended that we try rakia, a Bulgarian brandy made from fruits like plums, apricots, peaches, and other stone fruits. We ended up having a good time at the bar, sampling small shots of rakia, and our final consensus was that “it’s not that bad.”
Upon returning to our apartment, we made dinner, got cozy, and researched a day trip expedition for the next day. We settled on the Seven Rila Lakes hike, a popular and iconic trek in the Rila Mountains, about 1.5 hours away from Sofia. We booked the trek through GetYourGuide and went to bed.
The next morning we kicked off our day early, just grabbing a quick coffee and making some toast before gearing up for our big hiking adventure.
Our meeting point was at 8 am at Alexander Nevsky Cathedral – a beautiful church with a shiny gold dome – hard to miss. The bus ride to the Seven Rila Lakes took around 2 hours with absolutely stunning mountain views.
But here’s the kicker: when we arrived around 10 am, there was an absolutely monstrous line we had to queue in.
Unbeknownst to us, the hike started with a chairlift, and we had to stand in 1 line to purchase lift tickets, and then in another line for the lift itself. The chairlift did not allow online purchases or any purchases in advance, and it was Saturday in the summer, so tons of people were queuing for the hike. We ended up queueing for almost 2 hours. Not only that, but the lift ticket wasn’t included in the price of the tour, so we had to fork that out of pocket too.
When we were almost at the front of the lift line, our guide let slip that it was actually possible to hike up from the base instead of taking the chairlift, but it “would’ve taken about 2 hours so he decided not to tell us”. We would have definitely hiked straight up had we known!
The chairlift took about 20 minutes and we arrived at the top just after noon. Our guide let us know our meeting time was at 3:55 pm back at the lift. Knowing the hike was over 6 miles round trip, we knew it would be a rush with less than 4 hours for the whole shebang.
The hike was stunning but completely packed with people (our fault for attempting this hike on a Saturday). Many of the people had zero spatial awareness, hogging the whole path, even when they saw us trying to get by. I nearly got nailed in the face by a kid swinging around his hiking pole.
As the name promised, the loop took us past 7 absolutely gorgeous glacial lakes surrounded by stunning mountains. It took us just under 1.5 hours to get up to the last lake, and we were hustling.
At the top, we found a cute spot overlooking 3 of the lakes, ate our lunch, and flew my drone.
On the way down we were able to stop and fill our bottles with glacial water from the mountains. It was delicious and refreshing!
Heading back down was kinda tricky; there were lots of loose rocks and loads of people. We decided to take an alternative route back, where we passed through fields of wildflowers with patches of snow and ice on the ground. It looked like something out of the Alps!
Unfortunately, we underestimated how far away from the chairlift we were as we took a different route back, and we realized we only had 20 minutes to make it back to the meeting point. We basically ran the last mile to the chalet and arrived just before 4.
Overall, the hike was absolutely gorgeous but we felt like the tour wasn’t worth it. We paid $30 USD a person for the “tour”, which didn’t include the lift tickets and the guide didn’t actually guide us. Lift tickets were a separate 13 euros a person, so between the 3 of us, we paid over 100 dollars basically for a shared van ride. It felt like a rip-off.
We were back on the minibus by 4:55. The drive home was uneventful, and we arrived home around 7 pm. Michele decided to head out for a local dinner, and I took care of some planning. Having been underwhelmed by Sofia in general, we decided not to extend our time and head to the next spot. Southern Albania was high on our list of places to visit, but quite far to get to from Sofia, so we decided to pitstop in Skopje, North Macedonia first. I booked our bus tickets and accommodation in Skopje, and researched some things to do, while Saz showered, heated up dinner, and did the last laundry load. We packed up our bags for our next day’s departure, and went to bed!
Overall, Sofia wasn’t really for us. The city just seemed unfriendly, boring, and a little bit abandoned. However, we did see signs that the local government was investing in new developments, construction, and renovations, so maybe Sofia will be the place to be in a few years.
The next morning, we called a cab to the bus station and got ready for our next adventure – Skopje, North Macedonia!