I am on my third full day in Romania. After sleeping through my first night I have had two nights of waking up around 2 am and having a few hours of wakefulness before falling into a deeper sleep for another couple hours. Not helping is that Bucharest is hot. Temperatures have been up to the high 30s centigrade and nights can be a bit warm.
Despite this I am enjoying a casual approach to a city I visited last year and so haven’t done the formal tourism as much as wandered and relaxed. It is nice to explore some of the local parks despite the temperature. My sister suggested going to Circus Park, or Parcul Circului in the local context, which was a small city park with a nice water feature in the middle. A few locals were enjoying the shaded paths by the water.
I also started planning for the initial trip from the base of my sister’s apartment in Bucharest. I am fortunate that my sister, Fiona, has a week off and has a vehicle. Our plan is to do a loop in central and northern Bulgaria over the upcoming week.
We will start with a night in Veliko Tarnovo and seeing the Monastery of the Transfiguration just north of this city. We will continue south to Plovdiv, considered the oldest settlement in Europe with over 6000 years of known history from the area. We will enjoy staying in the Old City and exploring some of the history of this city. From there we will head to the capital of Sophia for a few days. During this stay we are hoping for a day trip to the Rila Monastery and a hike to the Seven Lakes. On the return we hope to check out Pleven. It should be a busy but enjoyable trip.
BorealHiker 