Melnik to Sophia

The hilly terrain leaving Melnik.

The road followed this river through the gorge and mountains.

The road out of Melnik with a chateau overlooking the vineyards.

Melnik is famous as Bugaria's best wine region. Here, a winemaker is espousing the hangover free qualities of his old-world , traditionally made organic wine. He had little time for wine of the new world such as Australia.

The cave keeps the wine at a constant temperature. This wine has been made by the same family for 150 years.

Melnik to Blagoevgrad (Thurs 29th May: 84.5 km @ 20.5kph)

We departed Melnik at 8:30 after a typical Bulgarian breakfast of black coffee, omolette and not much else. The road was initially undulating through farmland studded with vineyards and the occasional chateaux. Our exit from Melnik was much more straight forward than our arrival- the road showed some sign of maintenance.

Back on the E79 we joined the stream of trucks and other traffic heading north towards Sofia, the capital city. Our road today cut through mountain country via a gorge. The road was surprisingly flat but with little shoulder as it followed the course of a river and the occasional tunnel through the mountainside. We found flashing lights to be very handy. As we rode into Blageovgrad, (pop 80,000) we were not impressed by the road surface or the number of trucks competing for space on the roads. After a quick ride up the main street the drabness of the place was apparent. Did we really want to stay there? We ducked into the railway station and the next train for Sophia was leaving in 30 minutes so we decided to catch it the final 120km or so. The fare was very cheap: about $15 for both of us and 2 bikes.

After a pleasant 2hr30min train journey we arrived in Sophia and booked into The Mostel Hostel that Sigrid had been reading about in The Lonely Planet. All that was available was a dorm room, so we booked it for two nights.