This latest trip to Sofia was again as part of a stop over on the UK to Bansko route. Unlike many ski towns, Bansko is an year round town with plenty to offer those whose idea of a holiday involves outdoor activities, nature and hikes in the mountains as well as great restaurants serving fantastic Bulgarian cuisine. Sitting on the edge of the pristine Pirin National Park, the cobblestoned old town with stone-and-timber houses with high walls built to keep out bandits gives the town a character that many ski towns do not have.

On this return from Bansko, I had a day spare to explore Sofia. Despite being a visitor here on multiple occasions, I've rarely been anything more than a rushed passer when passing various monuments or notable buildings. This visit changed that.

As usual, the reason for my presence in Sofia was just as a transit point between getting from the UK and Bansko. However this time, upon returning to Sofia I had the rest of the day to explore before the flight back to blighty. Getting the bus was in itself an event as the bus to the airport did not depart from the main bus or train station. The customary poor customer service and disinterest at the bus station was no surprise so as I wandered the bus and train station looking for someone able to help I attracted the usual sharks offering me a taxi ride for a stupid price.

However, outside the train station and 100m from the bus station there are more buses and a number of cabins which sell tickets for other buses and after finding a Bulgarian Spanish speaker with some English, my Spanglish mix got me the information I needed and several more enquiries later I worked out how to get the bus to the airport. This was no straight forward matter as it involved a change at the Hotel Plisca and then another bus. Still, the cost of getting to the airport was only about £2.

Two years after purchasing my off plan ski resort apartment and much hassle later, it was finally time to return to Bulgaria to take possession! Unlike some buyers in Bansko who have been hit by legal issues, dodgy builders, and the global financial crash, my property has actually been built - for this I have to be thankful even if the price has reduced by about half.

Many travel from Sofia to Bansko via taxi or arranged pick up which is costly. I elected to get the bus which was a much more daunting prospect particularly because in Bulgaria they use the Cyrillic alphabet and reading signs and destinations is near to impossible to the linguistically ignorant.

Tourist information was your usual Bulgarian poor customer service. The agent sat behind a glass screen and let me stand in front of her for 2 minutes before acknowledging me. She advised me which bus I needed for Sofia Central Station (bus) but did not go anywhere near the proverbial extra mile; just the bare minimum information and then back to sit behind her glass screen. What a welcome awaits the traveller to Bulgaria!

In the end the bus I needed seemed some time off so I got a minibus into Sofia. This did not go to the station but with much effort, someone told me I would be able to get the number 7 tram to the station. Getting the tram was a challenge after being dropped off but after getting it and being the smiley, stupid foreigner some women helped me as best they could and the driver and one of the female passengers advised me where to get off. My new friend then escorted me to the station which entailed a 5 minute walk.

In the station I was confronted with dozens of kiosks for different bus companies and this is where the ability to read Bulgarian would have been very useful. In the end I went to what appeared to be an information point and an English speaker there sold me a ticket for the bus to Bansko and the rest was straight forward.

After returning from Bansko (Bansko, Feb 2006) I had to return to Sofia airport to fly back to the UK. While here though I had enough time to make a flying visit to the city to sort out some financial affairs. Buying property in Bulgaria also means having a bank account and this had to be set up before leaving. Why am I buying? Well, Bulgaria is due to enter the EU and the location where I want to buy is the best ski resort in Bulgaria, with the mountains being the highest out of the other well known skiing locations, thus increasing the chances of snow. I looked at Cyprus and Cape Verde. The pros and cons of each is not a topic for this blog but maybe I'll revisit this in 10 years or so.

At the wedding reception the devious Richard kept all his friends on separate tables to minimise trouble. This was actually for the best as it allowed us to meet and speak to Bulgarians though in my case conversation had to be conducted through an interpreter. One thing that didn't need translation though was the drinking. Our wine glasses were kept filled with a delicious wine from the bride's father's own vineyard as well as a shots glass that contained a foul spirit called rakia. This glass is kept topped up and ensured much merriment by the time the dancing began. The dancing had a very Greek feel to it but as Greece shares a border with Bulgaria and both were ruled by the Ottomans it is no surprise that there are overlaps in culture.

The night ended with a nightclub but after this we retired to our hotel at about 4AM to play in the casino. I've never been in a casino so I can't compare but there was no shortage of women in micro skirts either bringing around free food and drink or dealing the cards. Our game was 21 and we played this till 7AM and rarely lost!

After we exchanged our chips and then made to leave, a heavy approached us asking 'You want girls? Coke?' Its 7AM and he's asking me if I want girls and coke! A couple of hours later we had to get up to check out. What a hangover! Our flight home was in two days but Hywel and myself just wanted to go home. We wasted £200 and bought another ticket basically because we had a hangover. Idiots.

Four years after first visiting Bulgaria I was back! The reason will be explained later but first, let's go back eight years to my student days. Sitting in the front room of our dirty student house was often the setting for all sorts of intelligent and often not so intelligent discussions. On one particular night in our final year the topic turned to who out of the nine of us would get married first. Form suggested the Cornish surfer, Stuart as he had been with his girlfriend from home since the first day of uni. In fact she was in Exeter so often that it took me over a term to realise that she wasn't actually an Exeter student.

The fact that when she did visit, Stuart spent most of his time playing Street Fighter II on his Sega Megadrive with all of his future house mates should have indicated that things might not have lasted. Anyway, after Stuart it was hard to decide who would be next. In fact it was easier to rank who would be one of the last to marry. In this case all the sensible money was on the hilarious and unpredictable Richard.

Reasons for this are many and will remain private. However, after the first year, whatever charm Richard did possess he soon lost in a haze. I remember one occasion in the second year when he started seeing 'Jo'. They went out a few times and she actually quite liked him. All well and good so far. To add to his good fortune he even had a double bed though one side of this was covered with essays, handouts and text books. Anyway, she stayed over one night but when we entered his room to interrogate him the next morning his bed was exactly the way as it always was - one side slept in and the other like a desk. 0/10 for effort Mr Chamberlain but it must have been cosy.

Those days are long ago however and since then Richard has certainly improved his female acquisition skills. He finally found a girl to love him and this reason is why I forcibly banished all memories of my first visit to Bulgaria when I felt permanently hungry and returned to be a guest at Richard's Bulgarian wedding!

Despite the changes since the fall of communism, Bulgaria still has the feel of a Cold War relic (Communism fell only less than 10 years ago). One of things that I found so different to back in the West was the way that some shops are no more than basements with their pavement level openings converted in to shop counters. Some shops have flimsy glass cases containing spirits outside. At night these can be easily smashed or opened and the contents carried off but no, the respect for law seems to be quite strong - or maybe they are filled with water.

For a westerner, prices were very good though as a foreigner, getting outrageously fleeced was not uncommon. Even price lists stated a separate price for a non Bulgarian.

As someone who loves to sample new foods, I was most disappointed and went for days feeling unsatisfied. In the shops, mince was more white than red (lost of it being fat). Basics were available but the choice and quality was not what was expected. MacDonalds featured quite heavily which is a rare item in my diet so I just felt worse after eating it. We visited a Mexican restaurant but despite ordering meat dishes the meat had to be searched for. More 'sin' carne rather than 'con'.

Taxi drivers! While the quality of driving varied, the quality of the cars varied far more. Some were modern cars while others were 'tin can' Trabant deathtraps. Putting on a seat belt elicited a response of damaged feelings with the driver telling that he his a very good driver and there is no need for a seat belt. Other taxis drivers were just scammers. Its always a good idea to ask the price before you start your journey but doing this can bring out a ridiculous amount. One one occasion we decided to go to another taxi. The driver from the first taxi then ran past us shouting to his colleagues to set a price. The c*nt.

терор на НАТО, translated into 'NATO Terror' was the graffiti that greeted me in Sofia. Why you might ask, considering that Bulgaria has an aspiration to join NATO and give themselves an insurance guarantee against future Russian aggression? 

Well, three days prior to my visit, several stray missiles landed in the Sofia suburbs fired from NATO aircraft during the campaign to oust the murderous Serbians from Kosovo. It seemed that many people thought that the Serbs should be left to get on with their genocide and after a visit to the Museum I could see why. What was NATO's right to get involved in this? It seems that Kosovo has belonged to almost all of the competing powers in the Balkans at some point within the last 100-200 years.

The Serbians claim that Kosovo is part of Serbia and that it is Serbia's right to put down revolutionaries and separatists - as did Russia in Chechnya, also using the same playbook of genocide and war crimes. Anyway, sovereignty of Kosovo is a long complicated history and politics, ethnicity plus morality all make for a long discussion not suitable for here.

My friend Richard was living in Sofia in-between jobs and when friends are based abroad it would be rude not to visit and make use of free accommodation. My first night involved a party in a halls of residence at Sofia University which made for good fun - my uni days were less that four years ago so the good days were back. After that it was a cab (they were so cheap) to some club where Richard had a dispute over the price of a round of drinks. We were overcharged (not by much) but Richard would not stand for this.

'Security' was eventually called and Richard got wrestled into a headlock, dragged down the stairs and thrown out onto the road with a kick in the ribs added. Indignant, he got back to his feet, brushed himself down and offered the gorilla more money either as thanks for the kicking or in hope to regain entry. It was accepted but also got him another kicking.