Day 21: Smyadovo to Zvezdets

I woke up late behind the petrol station in my tent at 8 before I packed up quickly and I was waved off by the smiling petrol station man who had just done an all nighter and seemed absolutely fine! I’d remembered the evening before to buy some croissants in a shop in Šumen so I finished off a few of those as I did the first few miles.

The road deciding to end just as I started my little ‘Shortcut’.

The first 30km was along a mountain road which gradually got steeper and steeper. There was a point at which I had to stop whilst going up one of these passes to fill my water bottles from the spring taps that are up the mountain. I was meant to be following the road, the 73, until I reached Karnobat but on my map I saw a short cut on what was a smaller road so I decided to take it as it was going through some villages too. The road up until then had been EU paid for (that’s not my opinion they had signs to say so) but as I turned off it turned to a fragmented broken concrete/tarmac mess. At times it was smooth runway style but mostly it was very old and in need of serious repairs. Having said that the road was all mine and for the first ten miles I didn’t see a single other vehicle. I then stopped to take some pictures and have a bit of water when over the brow of the hill I’d just climbed I saw a brand new 2015 reg white transit van appear and even more weirdly it had an English numberplate! After frantic waving the guy stopped and I found how that the UK tomtom decided this was a main road and he was headed to Burgas. He was driving the under 17 English UEFA cup football team kit out to Bulgaria where there was some kind of tournament (maybe you can tell I don’t follow football). We chatted for a while with him in disbelief at the quality of the road before he set off again bumping and bouncing through the potholes as he went. I never got a picture or asked if there might have been a spare shirt, he seemed like the kind of person that might have said yes!

Jepe, who I met in the town of Lyulyakovo.

I carried on for a few more miles before I bumped into another cycle tourer called Jepe in the town of Lyulyakovo, he was a swede and was making his way from Istanbul to Sweden. We talked for a bit as his route was going back through where I had been the last few days and my onward route was exactly where he had just been so I knew when I left him what the next few days on the road held in store to Istanbul which was handy.

Once  was able to get back onto the main road, the 208, the surface definitely improved and I was able to get some miles in before I hit 100km in Burgas at 4.15. From there it was 49km more until I got to Zvezdets, which was south, where I would work out how I would sleep that night. I was planning to find somewhere before dark to camp.

The miles dropped away quickly but the road wasn’t flat with a lot of up and down. I had managed 45 of the 49km by 8.30, just before it turned dark and thought I could do the last few pretty speedily as the road had been downhill for the last few kilometres just as it started to rain. The rain turned torrential immediately and the hill got steeper and steeper before the light went and I had to stop and turn the front lights on as well. I was so close, yet it felt like everything was trying to stop me. The hill was slippery so a few times I nearly slipped off the tarmac down a steep bank to my left. I eventually made it to the town at 9.15, with the last 4km kilometres taking me nearly an hour. I was pretty fed up and decided I would try and sleep anywhere other than my tent. The shopkeeper was just locking up when I was arrived and said there was a hotel 40km down the road into Turkey. My heart sank but some kids came up to me, i was sure to either try and ride my bike or ask lots of questions, which at that point I really didn’t fell like talking to anyone. They did lead me to a guesthouse though and I managed to find a room, it was very kind of them and afterwards I felt a bit bad for not trusting them from the start as I’d been sceptical.

My room in the guest house with the eight policemen. A funny night with too much Rakia!

In the guesthouse I had one of the best nights I’d had all trip. I was greeted by the owner who spoke english and shown the room which was great. I was also shown the ‘mess’ room as he called it and there were 8 policeman all having a few drinks and chatting. They insisted that after I put my bike in my room I came and joined them. Before I had barely made it into my room a guy came and again insisted I came and joined them when I was ready. About a minute later another guy came and insisted I came and joined them when I was ready. I’d barely been in the building before four different people had come and insisted that I come to join them. I changed and went to join them. I may have got to bed about 3? After the beer had run out, which there had been plenty of, the national Bulgarian drink appeared – Rakia. It was described to me as a home-brew vodka. Which apparently is marketed at about 45% but people only really like 65%+, or thats what I was made to believe at least. As you can imagine I slept like a log!

The next day I was going to be making my way into Turkey to Saray, which would only be 120km from Istanbul for the day after.

Day 21 stats: 153.13km at an average of 17.6km/h. Vertically 1,588m climbed, the most climbing since northern France!

Trip total: 2142km at an average of 18.8km/h. Vertically 11,603m climbed.