WE FELL IN LOVE WITH BULGARIA.

Good morning from a beautiful village in central Bulgaria. We arrived here pretty late last night so we head out to grab some food in a local restaurant and we stayed in this beautiful guest house. So today unfortunately we have to leave and head back into Plovdiv but before we do that let's head further into Bulgarian mountains. So where we are we're just about to enter the central Balkan national park which is interesting because when you look at it on a map it's like a really long and thin strip and i read that only at the maximum is 10 kilometers wide and we're actually driving on a road called the Trojan pass which i thought was a main road but we've turned off one of the main roads which is the route number six and come onto this one and yeah i'm not so sure anymore. So the views up here are absolutely stunning and we've made it to nearly the top but we just had to pull over and show you this one. Oh my god. I think it was 30 degrees down in the valley and it's showing 21 now isn't it already and we're still not all the way at the top. Maybe that's why i love mountains so much. Maybe. Would you believe it's already nearly one o'clock and we still haven't eaten? Let's put that right. The thing is we found a really good place online but we only have a little tiny bit of cash left so if they don't take cards we're not eating today. Fingers crossed. Fingers crossed. Pray for us. Stomach's crossed. Spin round. Could be closed. The thing is on the door there it's written 10 till 12 at night so it's one o'clock guys. What's going on? Let's spin round. Damn it it had such good reviews online. We're just gonna drive around and see if there is anywhere else around here, preferably nearby, that's open and takes cards. No. Cash only. She said there's an ATM in the centre but she did direct me but my Bulgarian's a bit rusty. Let's go find a petrol station. We just returned the car back and now let's head into Plovdiv. So fun fact, Plovdiv is actually one of the oldest cities on earth. It's over 6000 years old which is mind-blowing to be honest and it possibly could be the oldest city in Europe. It's certainly one of. Incredible. Apparently that building right there was built before Christ. Did you know that? You're not even 30 yet. Bad jokes are coming in. Too early. You gotta start early. You gotta start early. So for those of you who don't know the official language in Bulgaria is Bulgarian which is a South Slavic language and the script they use for writing is the Cyrillic script and actually the Cyrillic script was invented here in Bulgaria. As a proper Slav and a native Russian speaker, Matt's fluent in Russian too, it's been quite fun trying to see similarities and differences with Bulgarian and trying to get by speaking a bit of Bulgarian. It's been really fun. Plovdiv's not only the Bulgarian capital of culture but in 2019 it was also the European capital of culture and it's also known as the city built on seven hills and we're discovering at the moment that some of those are quite steep. Either that or we're just really unfit. I think it's both. Do you reckon it's both? I was going to blame the steepness but probably it's both. What a view. Was it worth the steps up? I could walk back down and back up again. Go for it. Only said it for the camera. For hundreds of years Bulgaria was under the control of the Ottoman Empire and you can definitely see that in the architecture when you walk around Plovdiv. It's a really interesting combination actually of old Ottoman architecture as well as Bulgarian Orthodox architecture and of course the modern buildings as well. Really really beautiful. You can see it all from up here as well. Stunning. So the time is quarter past eight and after being on the go since about eight this morning we both definitely hit the wall to be honest. We just sat down on this bench and I felt myself nodding off. I'm not gonna lie. So on that note this city is absolutely beautiful. We'd love to explore even more but we've got a train at 12 o'clock tonight. Not a train, a bus. That's how tired I am. A bus at 12 o'clock tonight from Plovdiv all the way to Istanbul. So for the next three or four hours we're just gonna sit down, chill out, try not to fall asleep try not to fall asleep and try and get some strength for that bus journey. Thanks for watching this video and see the next one!