Bulgaria

2 Wheels to China Ratings

Food & Drink: 8/10

There were a great many traditional Bulgarian restaurants everywhere we went, and they were uniformally good. The cuisine seemed to have borrowed bits from Turkish, with lots of grilled koftas and kebaps, but we think this is a good thing. There are of course loads of uniquely Bulgarian dishes as well

and we found the stews to be particularly good. We can't recall if there was a local beer or not - we had though it was Tuborg until we discovered that this is Turkish. Bulgarian red wine is also excellent.

Road conditions: 6/10

Some were very potholed and badly surfaced, others were well sealed and quite smooth. We think this may be because there was never really that much traffic in Bulgaria to balls the roads up very quickly. Not the greatest, to be sure, but surprisingly good in places. The roads are quite narrow and they do not always have a run-off. When they do it is usually smaller than the other countries we have been through.

Traffic: 8/10

Not very much of it. We deliberately avoided major routes wherever we could after our experiences in Romania, but even so the traffic was light. There were a large number of horse and carts in Bulgaria (far, far more than in Romania), so the cars are probably used to slow moving vehicles, which is good news for cyclists.

Scenery: 8/10

Bulgaria was hillier all the way than we where expecting, but this resulted in the views being that much more amazing. They equalled anything we had seen before. The approach to Veliko Tarnovo was particularly spectacular.

People: 9/10

Haven't a bad word to say about a single encounter with a Bulgarian. Families in their horse drawn carts cheer and wave at you, villagers shout greetings as you go past, and everyone and their dog will stop to help if you even remotely look stuck.

Bureaucracy: 6/10

Resgistering wherever you stay in the country is a bit tiresome, although not the end of the world. Though we handed them over, no one actually checked our registration slips when we left the country.

The entry into Bulgaria was the slowest we had at that point. Not that there were any problems, it just took a long time. This will of course be redundant when they enter the EU in 2007.

Miscellaneous