Featured Destination
Balkans
Hidden Spots in the Balkans to Visit this October
As the hot, beach-perfect summer days are behind us and the winter with its enticing opportunities for playing in the snow is still far away, BalkanTravellers.com provides you with five places throughout the Balkans that warrant a visit during the autumn. Going to any of these off-the-beaten-track places is an awarding experience at any time of the year, but the traveller who ventures there during the off-season has them even more to himself than usual.
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Epicure
Balkans
Balkan Culinary Wars II: The Epic Battle over a Vegetable Relish
Ajvar, lyutenitsa, zacuscă or biber salçası? The peppers, tomatoes and aubergines purée is to inflame as much hostility as the Macedonian issue a century ago.
The whole thing must have started innocently enough, with the intoxicating smell of autumn peppers, grilled over a metal plate.
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Routes Less Travelled
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Balkan Mysteries: The Bosnian Pyramids of Semir Osmanagić
Visoko, around 30 kilometres away from Sarajevo, became the empire of an adventurer who attempted to turn ideas about Europe’s history upside down
I drive along, like a snail, on the only stretch of highway in Bosnia, surrounded by ancient trucks spewing out toxic smoke, and the thirty kilometres start seeming like a hundred. After following the directions of a competent guidebook – “drive straight for fifteen minutes and then turn right,” I enter Visoko. Full Story
Urban Browser
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Bosnia’s Dark Icons: The Bridge on the Drina, Višegrad
Višegrad is Bosnia’s Oświęcim, where people are trying to live among the ruins of others’ tragedies and collective crimes. The Nobel prize-winning writer Ivo Andrić, who described 400 years of the town’s dramatic Balkan history, did not live to witness the tragic continuation of his chronicle. Though it would have hardly surprised him that the bridge on the Drina is the scene on which it took place. Full Story
Curiosity Chest
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Want an "Obama" Suit? Go to Bosnia
A Bosnian clothes-making company has started selling a new line of suits for men named “Obama,” after the newly elected US President.
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Bulgaria 3/7/14
Bulgaria
Treasure-Hunting in Bulgaria’s Eastern Rodopi Mountains: Ancient Sites and Whimsical Rocks
While Bulgaria’s seaside and mountain resorts continue to attract the bulk of both domestic and international tourists, more unconventional destinations around the country are also starting to become popular with travellers. Among their advantages are the smaller or nonexistent tourist crowds, as well as the alternative tourism opportunities they provide.
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Bulgaria in 5 days: Shumen, South of Nowhere
Bulgaria
Bulgaria in 3 Days: Sofia and Mount Vitosha
Hidden Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Along Suleiman the Magnificent's Bridge in Svilengrad, South-Eastern Bulgaria
The Ottoman bridge over the Maritsa River is not only a predecessor (and maybe even a prototype) of the famous bridge on the Drina, but it is also superior to it in terms of scale and splendour. The legend about its origins is as dramatic as that of the Drina Bridge, although it did not win the Nobel Prize like Ivo Andrić’s novel that recounted it Full Story
Bulgaria
Genghis Khan’s Descendents Swap Central Asia’s Altay for Bulgaria’s Balkan Mountain
Bulgaria
Kabiyuk, The Horse "Factory" Bulgaria Inherited from the Ottoman Empire
Balkan Coasts
Balchik, on Bulgaria’s Black Sea, where Romanian Queen Marie Left Her Heart. In a Jar
Bulgaria
It was in 1940. In a glass jar in a chapel in Balchik on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast rested the heart of Queen Marie of Romania. It was her last wish before she died. She had loved Balchik.
The coastal resort was Romanian territory at that time. But in 1940 Bulgaria regained its possession with the help of Nazi Germany. The Bulgarians promised the Romanians “that the Queen’s heart, if you choose to leave it there instead of transporting it to a suitable place inside Romania, will be surrounded by all attributes of attention and respect.” Full Story
Gökçeada, Turkey: The Island and its Treasures
Armenian History Floats on the Waters of Lake Van in Turkey
Balkan Mountains
Roman Ruins and a Rural Paradise in Bulgaria’s Western Rodopi Mountains
Bulgaria
In the spot where the majestic Pirin and Rodopi Mountains come together, around 50 kilometres south of the major ski-resort of Bansko, lays perhaps the best destination for rural tourism in Bulgaria. The mineral water springs of the village of Ognyanovo and the spectacular architecture of the villages of Leshten and Kovachevitsa, situated on the rolling western-most hills of the Rodopi Mountains, were known only to Bulgarian village life afficionados until a few years ago. Recently, however, they have started to open up and attract
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Meteora, the Second Sky Over Greece
Bulgaria: Strandzha's Mysteries
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Photogalleries
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A Perfect Shot
BULGARIA D'OR: The Bulgarian countryside, patinated with the noble golden dust of the autumn. Photographs by Lode Desmet
360 degrees Bulgaria, an exhibition by photographer Alexandar Ivanov, is on display at the Sea Garden in Varna until August 28. It will be shown at Plovdiv’s Central Square from Sept 5.
The exhibition Photographs of a Trip Through Bulgaria by Hungarian photographer András Balla can be seen in Sofia's Hungarian Cultural Institute, at Aksakov 16 Street, until August 22
Instant Spring in Sofia | Photographs by Lode Desmet
Off-the-season Beauty of Bulgaria's Black Sea Coast | Photographs by Adelina Iliev
Bulgaria's Northern Black Sea Coast
Photographs by Albena Shkodrova
excellent smugs
Annoyances in the Balkans
Balkans
Relentless Homophobia Rages in the Balkans
Be IN-tolerant! Be normal!, appeals a poster (pictured above) that recently flooded the streets of the Bulgarian capital, Sofia.
As the first gay pride parade in Bulgaria is about to take place, amid strong opposition by nationalistic organisations and a large part of society, the high levels of persistent homophobia in the country and the Full Story
Insiders' Advice
If the relentless homophobia is already that bad, what's the attitude in general towards HIV/AIDS, given the rather worrying HIV-prevalence in Eastern Europe and Russia?
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Is it easy to drive in the Balkans? Depends. If you are looking for adrenalin, this is a cheap way to get it. Expats say the best tactics is not to get annoyed.
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How to pick the right time to go? Winter is beautiful in the high mountains, the problem is, it can be so cold! Then again, who cares how cold it is - the locals have a cheap cure: heavy red wine. Sometimes warmed up.
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You can't trust local maps. Nor some international travel guides. One of them, for instance, says, that Neretva River in Bosnia and Herzegovina flows FROM the Adriatic towards the inland of the Balkans, never reaching the sea. OK, how about the Neretva delta and channel in Croatia?
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The Big Book of Travelling
United States
The Rise of Burlesque in New York: Tassels and the City
Burlesque – the more audacious relative of commedia dell'arte, is in revival. A reality in “upside down style”, this creative, witty and softer version of striptease is back on stage, following an absence of nearly 80 years. In New York, Anjeza Bojku scoped out several burlesqee venues for BalkanTravellers.com. Full Story
Thailand
A Short Guide to the Peculiarities of Thai Food
Travel News
5 November 2008 | The Eastern Neighbours film festival will show over 30 films from the Balkans region in the Louis Hartlooper Complex in the Dutch city of Utrecht between November 6 and 9.
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Blog
Adrien and Martin Joly : From Gravina to Atella Adrien and Martin Joly : From Bari to Gravina Adrien and Martin Joly : Goodbye Montenegro
