I spent two nights in Sofia, Bulgaria on my recent trip and loved the city…it’s a treasure in Eastern Europe.
Sofia, Bulgaria – A City I Would Return To
12 years ago on a trip to Bucharest, I took the train to Ruse, Bulgaria and spent an afternoon there…just so I could add Bulgaria to my country count. But this was my first “real” visit to Bulgaria and I thought the capital city of Sofia was lovely.
I stayed at the Hyatt Regency, located in the heart of town near St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral and used a combination of walking, taxi, and Metro to get around.
The city feels “Russaian” in terms of some of the Soviet-era buildings and the Cyrillic alphabet, but the people and culture felt more like the West than the East.
Coffee was excelent…I found a very nice place and will detail this in a separate post.
I also enjoyed excellent cuisine, both Bulgarian food and international food.
One highlight was visiting the Socialist Art Museum, which focuses on cartooning during the communist period but also has a sculpture garden where all the ex-Soviet statues were moved after Bulgaria dumped Todor Zhivkov and held free elections in 1990.
It has been quite some time since I visited a new city (for me) in Europe and so this was a really fun couple of days.
Next time, I want to drive to the Buzludzha Monument (about three hours away), which I would have done if I had one more day.
When I get to the trip report, I will publish a photo essay of my time in the city and a separate photo essay of the St. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral.
If you’re looking for somewhere new to visit in Europe, do consider Sofia.
One of the nicer cities in the former Communist bloc. The Hyatt Regency is great too.
Sofia is great. Amazing how much nicer it is then Bucharest which is grey and drab.
Did you hear the song Despacito much?
Can’t wait to see the picture of you donning a Kukeri. What place did you like best for Banitsa?
Had to google that one! 😉
Wow.
Another reason to return.
Sofia is a great city, but it’s a Best Western for me! Can’t live high on the hog if I want to travel.
The Hyatt is only 5k points per night and a category one, the lowest you can get.
Sadly, now a category two with the recent chart change this month.
But yes, I used points. Much better than paying 150EUR/night.
And still a great buy as a Cat 2.
What a great article. Thank you for sharing your experience in Sofia.
You can also go skiing at Mt. Vitosha. Sofia is a nice city indeed, but my goodness, do people like to smoke there.
It seems though that smoking is now prohibited inside restaurants so it wasn’t too bad.