I had long ago heard of Whirling Dervishes but, to be honest, had no idea who they were, what they did (well, ok… I figured it probably had something to do with whirling), or where they were.  Until I got to Turkey. While we were walking by the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, we were (surprise, surprise) approached by a man trying to sell us tickets to a Mevlevi (Whirling Dervishes) &#91read more]

Turkey is different from Western European and North American countries in a lot of ways. That’s why it’s been so fun for us to visit. Here’s just three examples from Istanbul of how we were treated to a level of hospitality far greater than what we’ve grown to expect more westernized places. 1. The Bookstore We came to Turkey wanting to walk the Lycian Way, but we knew little to &#91read more]

There’s an old Turkish proverb that says coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.  Naturally, that’s what Turkish coffee is. Mike and I were never coffee drinkers before we left home.  I would have the occasional half-coffee, half-hot chocolate but that was about it.  Mike wouldn’t touch the stuff.  Somewhere in Austria that started to change.  By the time we were living in Bulgaria, &#91read more]

We thought we had our Bulgaria to Istanbul travel plans cased.  We booked our night bus from Veliko Tarnovo in advance, had the paper ticket in hand, and even had a friend to drive us from our village to the door of the bus station.  We knew our hostel name and address in Istanbul and pre-planned a splurge on a taxi so we wouldn’t have to navigate the chaos of &#91read more]

As you’ve no doubt heard, we purchased a house in Central Bulgaria. This does not signal the end of our travels. In fact, we’ve already left Bulgaria and are currently exploring the countryside of Turkey. Now it’s all well and good for us to tell you that we bought a house, let you know how much it cost, gave some insights into Bulgaria’s bureaucracy, and showed you some pictures of &#91read more]

Here’s a little Bulgarian lesson for you… Дa = Da = yes He = Nay = no Simple enough, right?  Wrong, my friend.  So very wrong indeed. I thought that mastering the Cyrillic alphabet would be the biggest stumbling block to communicating in Bulgarian.  Of course, I was mistaken.  It was actually my neck that would get me in trouble. For 27 years of my life, I understood that a &#91read more]

Ah, the night lights. It seems pretty rare that we share our night time pics with you, and I say it’s high time we did. We spent a total of 4 nights in Sofia en-route from Belgrade, Serbia to our HelpX gig in the village of Vishovgrad (Central Bulgaria). Compared to Belgrade, Sofia seemed like a jewel. Plenty of green spaces, nice architecture, and a very welcoming culture, if the &#91read more]