My Trip To Sozopol

Well we eventually got to go to Sozopol – unfortunately not the way I intended though (My original plan!). As I said before, I usually go to our apartment with my two sisters some time in September. This year we went on the 23rd and to be fair, expected lots of places to be closed down in Vlas and Sunny Beach. However, we already knew the hydrofoil from Nessebar to Sozopol had already ceased running for the season so we decided to go by bus (on 2nd October).

All the best laid plans and all that ….

So we had it all worked out. Take the 9.35 am bus from Vlas to Sunny Beach and catch the 10.20 am from the bus station direct to Sozopol, returning back to Sunny Beach on the 4 o’clock-ish bus. Easy? No! We went to the little kiosk at Sunny Beach bus station to duly buy our tickets and was promptly told that “no buses to Sozopol”! Ok – plan B it was then. Take the bus to Bourgas and get no. 22 bus from there. Easy? Yes, actually.

Well, when I say “easy” – we cheated …

We got off the bus at Bourgas (there’s currently work going on at the main bus station so you’re dropped off just a little further along on the main road) and waited at the same bus stop for the Sozopol bus. (We knew this was the right bus stop ‘cos we’d been to Bourgas a few days before and literally saw a bus with Sozopol on the front of it). We’d waited a little while when a very friendly taxi driver came along and offered to take us for the same cost as the bus – 4.50 leva each. He also asked some other people who quickly agreed that that was a very fair deal. So that’s what we did. Seven of us piled into the taxi and off we went (don’t worry – it was an 8-seater vehicle).

Our Own Personal Tour Guide

It was quite entertaining. There were three people sat in the very back of the taxi, then the three of us in the middle, one passenger at the front and then the taxi driver of course. All the passengers apart from us were presumably Bulgarian as the taxi driver only spoke to us for the whole of the journey! He explained that Sozopol used to be known as Apolonia and that, like Nessebar, it was split into the old and the new. The old part was the best place to go to as it had many original buildings and was full of charm and character, whereas the new part was, well “new” and was probably not so interesting (we’ll maybe go there next time). He also mentioned the names of some of the churches – which I promptly forgot! He was kind enough to tell us that the bus back to Bourgas was every hour and even dropped us off close to where the bus would be. As we didn’t know how much the ticket for the bus was, we were a bit cynical as to whether he told the truth about charging the same fare as the bus (that seems a bit unfair to say really), but he did – it was 4.50 leva back and took about 40 minutes. Dual carriageway takes you virtually all the way.

Although it was really quiet everywhere and many places were closed, it was a very good day and here’s some photos to show you what we saw (I’ll maybe add to these from time to time so keep looking) …