A Modern Odyssey in the Mountains Above Sofia

So So SO Soooo. My knees are a bit creaky this morning, but before I tell you why I want to assure you that this harrowing tale has a happy resolution and I ask that you keep that in mind so that at the bleakest moments you won't be so overcome as to lose the will to keep reading.

So... (I just paused for about 5 minutes trying vainly to think of an opening line in Iambic pentameter... recognizing how long it was taking I have come to the conclusion that this tale shall be told in prose rather than verse... my apologies).


Ok... So: We got our collective shit together to go hiking only by about 1 in the afternoon yesterday. An hour or so later we were on a rickety communist era (potentially from the early years of real existing socialism) bus puttering at about 15 clicks up a winding dirt road to just above the tree line on Mt. Vitosha... directly below the 4th highest peak in the entire country (at just over 2000m). An other couple of hours of labourious trudging through snow later and we were sipping wine on a rocky outcropping just below said 4th highest peak deliberating whether or not to go the extra 150m over rock and snow to the top and risk being caught in the dark, or just lie and say that we had. We opted for the later. (By the way... the view from the summit was gorgeous... we could totally see the CN Tower). ... We ran straight down - which was exhilarating and effectively packed all of our shoes with slowly melting snow (when I finally took off my shoes about 4 or 5 hours later my feet were emitting waves of what smelled like freshly caught fish) - only to find that we had missed the last bus by 5 minutes. WE asked the dude parked right by the bus stop if he could fit us for the ride down and he was nice enough to oblige... two of us (there were four). After much negotiation we decided who got the spots alphabetically by the second letters of our middle names. Or so Karin, Brent and I understood. Dan (an Aussie who joined us) got shafted... he thought we were going by the first letter... his middle name is Warren. Anyway... Dan and I ended up fending for ourselves. We stuck out thumbs out at a couple of cars... the first was full, the second was being driven by sour looking old people who just made a face at us. So we walked back to the chalet parking lot to beg. On route we saw a parked cab in which people appeared to be having sex. We made lots of noise but were unable to get their attention (I think they were ignoring us). That was a no go.
All of the few cars in the lot were full... so that was a no go too. We also found out that the walk down the road would be about 2 and a half hours before even reaching the fringes of civilization (the sun would set in about an hour and a half). Finally we approached this couple who were snacking at a picnic table. They didn't really speak English but between the odd word that they knew, and my horrible Russian we were able to communicate to them that we had missed the last bus down. They told us that if we waited for half an hour we could go down with them. We were elated. I had a beer. Only once they took us plunging down an icy slope did we realize that they hadn't meant that we could come with them in their car... but on foot, bushwhacking. But we weren't really worried until they decided that we needed to cross three metres of icy pipe over rushing glacier water. At that point Karin and Brent had probably just arrived at the hostel. Neither of us fell in though my fine motor skills weren't great after the wine and beer and I had a couple of scary wobbles. I think the only thing that kept us in the game was the enthusiasm of our two guides who seemed really excited by our company (the man told us that he really likes Canada, Australia and New Zealand.... I don't really know why he threw New Zealand in there... he then segued into some elaborate story that involved Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Sydney Opera House and the 1980s. I couldn't really follow it.) An hour and a half later (10 minutes by our guide) we started to see signs of human activity again. We had crossed about 4 different ecological zones. We started to think that maybe they weren't taking us to their candy house to cook us (which had seemed more and more likely as the sun got lower and lower and we were still on game trails in a forest growing on a 45 degree slope). By the way... sorry this is so raw, I don't really have time to make this post right now so I'm trying to write it as fast as possible. They shook our hands triumphantly when we arrived at a bus stop and informed us that we would be in our hostel in like 20 minutes max! (I don't know where this guy learned to tell time). After waiting for 20 minutes a bus finally came... and after riding it for about 20 minutes we were booted out on some dark street in god knows what neighbourhood in Sofia. After getting contradictory directions from 3 people we just picked a direction and walked eventually finding a tram (by this time it's about 9pm and the stars are out) that went to a stop that we recognized. It being Sunday night it took another half an hour before it arrived and we only staggered into the hostel shortly before 10. Karin and Brent were very happy to see us. Apparently our being unaccounted for for like 3 hours was worrisome! They bought us dinner. The end.

PS - The night before we went to see the Magic Flute. Tickets were under 8 dollars. Champagne at intermission cost about one dollar. Eastern Europe rules.