Veliko Tarnovo - Bulgaria

Helloo helloo!

Here I go again to another trip that won’t take very long from Bucharest but will surely give a full day of things to try and see. We planned the trip for the beginning of March but as soon as you understand the weather in the Eastern Europe, you will realise that winter is not really finished until late March sometimes so no wonder everything was unfortunately still covered in snow. Regardless of that, the panoramas and the vibe of the city were quite magical anyway. We organized ourselves to go by bus and in around 3-4h we arrived in Veliko Tarnovo ready to explore!

Free walking tour – Tourism Office, at 11am every day

The city is not very hard to explore on your own because it doesn’t even have a city center. It is actually built in a line and you can easily find your way on its streets. Anyway, first thing that we did was the free walking tour because as I mentioned in my previous articles, it is the best option as a first comer in a city to get the layout of the place and understand what the main attractions have to offer and most importantly, if they are really for tour taste to go back where you think you’ll have the best time at. Not only that, but you will also learn a lot of interesting things about Bulgaria’s history.

Samovodska Charshia Market

One of the best places to take urban photos in Veliko is this street. It was full of workshops for wood carving and other traditional objects and it has plenty of souvenir shops to choose from – although some of them are quite overpriced. Unfortunately, the up or down walk on this streets will not take a lot of time since it is quite short, so we were a little disappointed. Still, the picturesque scenery is definitely worth a visit.

Tsarevets Fortress & the Church

For visiting the fortress you will need to get a ticket at the entrance, on the street, before entering the yard itself and start climbing the hill so be sure you purchase it before going up. The ticket is not expensive, only 6 lev and you can even ask for the student discount: 3.5 lev.

The Tsarevets Fortress was definitely a must do of the place and we were glad we went up to explore the park that transported us in Medieval Bulgaria. Right on top we saw the main attraction - the Patriarchal Cathedral St. Ascension which has a unique type of painting on the inside that actually made the cathedral stop the classic service and allow visitors only to admire the unusual paintings you need to see on your own here. Don’t try to look it up on the internet either since I think it will be something you have never seen before anyway and you’ll ruin the surprise.

Traditional Bulgarian food

When we got hungry we went to a restaurant called Asenevtsi which didn’t have a view, but based on its reviews the food was the one that attracted people inside. And we didn’t really mind since the weather was not very helpful in this regard – there was fog. Here my friends had chicken, appetizer, potatoes and two large beers each for only 30 lev and I had a soup, salad, tea and dessert for 25 lev. You can’t complain about the prices and the food was absolutely delicious!

At the end of our day we also visited Arbanasi and had a stroll around the town to find the Church of the Nativity of Christ that is actually carved in a rock. The modesty of it and the peace of the place transported us in a different way of living life. We lit a candle and took some time inside with ourselves before going back to the bus and head home, so it was definitely nice way to be grateful for a beautiful trip that has proven to be a nice discovery after all, even though the weather was not the best for it.

We are definitely going back in the summer to discover the ‘not so snowy and unveiled’ Veliko when the flowers are in full bloom and the sun will allow us to see more from the top of the hill. It’s definitely a nice place to be!

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