Last night in Bulgaria
After spending the day relaxing in the hotel we ate our final meal at 7:00pm. We had all checked out of our rooms earlier. The final step was to get our passports back from the hotel. The hotel checkout policy was actually very strict, and unbeknownst to us we were required to turn in some of these random towel tickets that half of the group had yet to use. They wanted to charge us 12 leva for each missing card, but our guide George convinced them to let us slide. They only other problem was a missing key from one wrestlers room. Our wrestler assured them that the key was lost, but they insisted that we could not leave until they had the key in hand. I am not for sure how but we got the passport and got down the road. We were only about 10 minutes out when the wrestler found the missing key among his possessions.
Because of the fiasco at the airport we were only able to visit Nessebar for an hour. It is a very picturesque seaside town with an abundance of old ruins. George tells us that it is one of the oldest cities in all of Europe. I snapped off a few pictures and some video, but really didn't have enough time to take it in well. It would have been nice to visit this spot during the day.
We boarded the bus to start our overnight journey back to Istanbul. I wasn't as tired as the first time we had made the overnight trip so I got to witness some of the roads that connected Bulgaria and Turkey. I would say that they are on par with the majority of the county roads in Western Nebraska. There were a number of harrowing switchbacks and hardly a light to be found on the desolate road.
We arrived to the border at around midnight. This time getting out of Bulgaria was very smooth. It only took about 10 minutes in all. We went through the normal routine in Turkey however in order to get into the country the did a search of our bus that involved tossing out a couple of our bags. At one time on the the customs guys came through our bus while smoking a cigarette and just about gassed us out. The rest of the night was pretty restless. It is kind of hard to sleep while the bus driver is blaring European Electronic music, but I can't ever complain about this guy. If he needs Techno to get in the zone so be it.
The drive into Instanbul was an absolute rat race. I can't believe the amount of traffic so early in the morning. In a couple of places the commuters took the liberty of converting the two lane roads in to three lanes. As we got closer to the airport it seemed to get worse. Once we got our luggage off the bus and made our way to our check in gate George parted ways with us. We will have a new guide for our afternoon in France. Time to board.
