Mt Vitosha, Sofia, Bulgaria

Regardless of how tempting it looks at 3am, a 3-odd storey tall bronze lion is not a jungle gym. I should have been put off by the 2.5m gate protecting it I guess, but it just made the challenge that much better and the reward of being completely covered in black dust and crap at the top of it was just icing on the cake. I think my ninja skills could do with a polish though after narrowly avoiding a stack from the top onto the concrete 9m below.

Our stay at the Hostel Mostel in Sofiya, Bulgaria has been awesome this far. Like the previous days, yesterday was basically another case of wake up, get your free breakfast, chat until lunch, do some sight seeing and get back in by 7pm for the free beer and pasta dinner. Total cost for the day = bugger all. The mission for the day was a trek to Mount Vitosha- I think its about 2800m altitude, and we started from 900m. After a couple of buses to get out there, we started our trek up the mountain to check it out. We weren't sure how it would be, having heard the chairlift has been shutdown the past 2 weeks and it is a 12 hour trek to the summit without the chair lift. When we got there, there was a small crew of downhill racers with their $8000+ dual shocked, hydraulic braked off road weapons just suiting up with the dainese body armour who were kind enough to act as translators for us to get tickets. Basically they take the bikes up on the chair lift, then race down any of the slalom tracks carved into the mountain and chair lift it back up to do it again: sweet way to spend a weekend! Before we left the hostel for the mountain Stan said I was optimistic heading out there with jeans, a t-shirt and a jacket. I understood what he meant when we jumped onto the chairlift and it entered the shadow of the mountain- A crisp maximum of 7 degrees, I would have traded my car for a set of gloves on the spot. Usually just my fingers go numb from the cold, but here I could see my legs but not feel them. Thinking about it, I don't believe I have seen Levis as recommended clobber for an Everest summit- now I know why.

Atop the mountain we were surprised to see yet another chairlift that seemed to just go on and on- up a rise, across a plateau, up another rise and out of sight somewhere in the clouds. About 2km later, it wound up on a huge open area above the clouds on a plateau covered in grass and rocks. looking across the plain, we spotted some snow on the ground in the distance and made a beeline for it. It was pretty cool when we got there- we had a snowball fight, did some dodgy snow angels, built a snowman... Daniel gave up with us after we were arsing around for 10 minutes and just went for a walk while we kept playing around in the snow like kids- Apparently when it snows every single winter in your home town, the novelty of the white powder wears off. The novelty wore off for me after my hands were completely wet, numb, bright red and I had melting snow all over me.

On the way back down the mountain we stopped in at a restaurant to just use the toilets, but after seeing the roaring log fire and felt the warmth returning some feeling to our numb extremities we took a seat next to the mafia convention happening in the corner and got stuck into a top notch feed, It was pretty funny- in the car park were all $100,000+ cars, inside everyone was in a suit, and then there was us bogans in jeans. Its funny how we have adjusted to food prices here- I was shocked at the $22 price for lobster given a big pub meal is $5, until I remembered how much it was last time I had it in Australia. hahaha $22!! The roast boar and other local "mountain food" specialties had us interested, but we all went in for more common local dishes in the end. We had entrees, ate and drank like kings and it was $70 for the three of us- So good!

Back at the hostel that night I tried to get through some of the Bulgarian Leva I took out from the ATM when we arrived so ducked out with Adam, a bloke from Melbourne and picked up some 2L bottles of beer at one of the hundreds of miniature bottle shops around the place and shared them with the crew at the hostel- I have to say its not helping though when beers are $2 for 2 litres. That price is ridiculous by the way: Its more expensive than that to make your own beer back home! After a few litres of pre-drinks we had a small crew together and made plans for a Friday night pub crawl. If only it worked out as planned! The first place was closed down, the second didn't exist, the third was "by reservation only" and we got denied entry when we didn't rock up in a chauffeur driver Merc like the other patrons did. The fourth was a winner though- a lively local haunt that was jam packed and played great tunes! It was $2 for a 500mL Stella, and I paid $3 for a shaker of about 15 shots of the bartender's special concoction more than a few times for the rest of the crew- awesome night. Back home, I'd have plowed through $200 pretty easy just on my beers- I didn't even notice a change in my wallet by the end of this night. I'm kind of surprised we didn't get turfed out of there in the end- especially after the girls started the limbo and drink balancing competitions in our corner of the place. How the bar only had one shaker mystifies me still, and having to barter with Bulgarians to try and get possession was a new challenge. The hike home was about as entertaining as our time at the pub too after an altercation with Ronald McDonald and the city's museum lion statues.

Me and Lyn just came across something for the first time so far in our travels too... A bloke we didn't like at our hostel. Its been kind of strange going from place to place, and all in between on tours, on the street and in our accommodation we consistently meet awesome interesting people that are great to chat to and we havn't met a single tool yet. Enter the politician from Israel. I think he enjoyed making girls squirm with awkward topics and just went from one chick to another doing the same- maybe theres some culture difference back home for him where its common to tell everyone about your love for prostitution, wars and strippers- I don't know. 2 days later people were actively avoiding him though and every new person he started chatting to had the same body language after a minute or two. Breakfast almost became a therapy session to recover from him haha.

A copper just came through our carriage taking photos around the train after our fourth separate passport presentation ceremony on our train from Sofia, Bulgaria to Belgrade in Serbia. There has been Bulgarian customs, Bulgarian Coppers, Serbian Coppers then Serbian Customs. We asked the copper what he was up to and he said its to inspect hiding holes for smuggled items- Guns, gold, cash, cigarettes... Its a pretty smart plan and he seemed well proud of the idea- stick a camera in the hole and take a flash photo, then have a look at the photo. It saves him having to wedge his head in every Little nook and cranny around the place. I was wondering why every inspection panel on the roof and walls were removed. Apparently smuggling is real common on this line, but no so much in the direction we are heading. Usually its from the non-EU and more lax Serbia across the border to EU member Bulgaria as the Union has tight controls over customs, tax charged on imports and limits to declared goods. It seems a quick prod of our bags was enough to satisfy the officers we didn't have AK's or one of the grenade launchers I'm looking forward to testing at a Serbian rifle range in there.

I'm not sure if Bulgaria will be an EU member for much longer though as they are having their fair share of issues at the moment that they are getting hauled over the coals for and copping financial penalties over. Their refuse depots are at capacity and there is 600,000 bales of garbage they don't have storage for, nor are there plans for a treatment or storage facility. There have also been EU grants stopped because corruption and Mafia activity is rife and there are no major plans for a resolution- in fact its only an issue because the EU has said it is. The 100 organised crime related executions in the past year was a bit of an eye opener though, and we have seen our share of dodgy dealings in the street but it hasn't effected us. I'm loving the advice we have been passed on: "If you are in a cafe and someone enters surrounded by four thick neck body guards, its not a safe place to be". Outside of the government There is also the issue of a Roma Gypsy population here too, and the racism against them is pretty strong, but that seems no different from the rest of Europe that has Romas in their midst. The stray dogs have been more of a concern for us: triggered by god-knows-what, if one barks, others just appear from out of the woodwork and then its on! Apparently a British woman was mauled and killed by a pack a while back so we have been pretty wary when around them, but again no issues so far. I'm becoming a fan of the oddball family of stray cats that live out the front of our hostel now. I'm told they have been evicted a few times by locals from the courtyard they are in, but they keep returning to laze around, leave paw prints on the residents cars and just look like they own the joint.