Philippopolis & Furious

Plovdiv is home to a cobbled old town, leafy parks with singing fountains and pastel coloured buildings which crest the longest pedestrian street in Europe. Most interestingly though, the city is one of the longest continually inhabited places on the continent and is built upon the ruins of an ancient Roman stadium, Philoppopolis. As a result, the grand columns have been excavated in chunks all over the place, including apparently in half of the dining room of the hostel I stayed at (a delightful little place btw.)

There's also some fun backstory to the Alyosha monument which dominates the skyline; a tribute to the soldiers of the Red Army, and for which Plovdiv has tried (and failed) to have removed on several occasions. It needed only one opportunity to get rid of me though, and after a dandy visit I was back on the road, or in this case, the tracks.

One of the many joys of travelling the Balkans is bearing witness to its broken transport culture. Take this train for example, didn't leave for 30 minutes after it was meant to (after all, the driver needs time for good smoke first, that's unavoidable!) We did eventually get moving though, even if the carriage shook like a maniac when working up to its max speed (i.e. jogging pace). I'm slightly surprised to have actually ended up in Bansko after 4h30, we didn't even derail once :( Check out the last pic for a chuckle at the route it took.

JJ out.Read more