Our bikes have fared pretty well too,
But the biggest surprise of the whole of the trip
Is to find out The Black Sea is blue!
Shumen - The Black Sea (Varna, Bulgaria)
The heatwave gave way to a tremendous storm, clearing the air and making riding conditions, at last, extremely pleasant again. What a difference 10° makes!
I would like to tell you that our surroundings also improved - but they didn't. Tumbleweed still blew through most of the towns and villages (although a little damper now), and the condition of the roads were as they had always been, though perhaps a little quieter.
From the looks we were getting it would appear that we may possibly have been the first cyclists to use the StevieVelo route. Some folks seemed so shocked to see us they didn't know what to do so simply turned away and pretended we weren't there. Others thought it highly amusing and returned our smiles and waves.
I also have to mention here that Steve had 2 more punctures on consecutive days bringing his total on this trip to a grand 7. There are no photos of me attempting to change an inner tube because... I haven't had ANY punctures!
We passed through one gypsy village where horses and carts were parked in driveways instead of cars, and the dark, sinewy people went about their business as if we didn't exist at all. Although we would have liked to, we didn't feel comfortable asking for a photo of their transport, and didn't fancy our chances of cycling out alive if we were caught taking a sneaky picture, so you'll just have to imagine how it was.
The StevieVelo route was much hillier than we've been used to, and on one of the days the climb continued for almost an hour.
On the last day we met a fellow biker - the only other cyclist we've encountered in Bulgaria! Alberto, from Spain, joined us and it felt good to share our moment of arrival at The Black Sea with somebody else.
Foolishly he stayed with us, as the beach hut we had booked was only another 10kms south of Varna. The map didn't quite show the final descent to the beach, which was an extremely steep hill through the forest, with 58 steps to negotiate!
At times it took all of us to manhandle the bikes, but this only made our arrival (and the cold beer) even sweeter!
Now we are here in Galata, enjoying a few days rest, before negotiating the road back to Varna, which we are assured is almost as steep as the forest route!
From there we shall pack up the bikes for our flights back to UK.
It certainly doesn't feel like we've cycled over 4000kms to get here, and there is no sense of jubilation, just a little trepidation that we've nowhere left to cycle. We are definitely more sad than glad now it is all over, and are already talking about where the next trip will be...!
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