God, I’d like to find the idiot that wrote that song and make ‘em come and live here just now !!!
I think these shots say it all..and no photograph can describe just how bad things have got…..
and those last few pics are taken on the main street up to the village centre..
Well may you ask ‘what street’….it wasn’t seen for days and when it eventually showed its face, it was a sheet of ice not disimiliar to a pane of glass. OK I saw some funny sights as cars tried valiantly to get up said street, and we really had a lot of fun just making our way up to the local bar for a few warming tipples, but when ALL the streets between you and just about everything are like sheets of oily glass…smooth, slippery and not really for driving on, the fun starts to wear off fairly quickly.
But, we did have a truly White Christmas…which was gorgeous. I had two guys from Australia, John and Roy, staying with me and two friends from the village joined us for a very enjoyable, very relaxing, very champagne-y Christmas Day.
The house looked lovely
and yes, I know the pics not that clear, but my camera just isn’t good enough for night shots…
and the table very civilised …well, at least for a the first few hours
The guys staying with me were fantastic and a great help with lunch and drinks. I thought I’d had an easy Christmas day last year, but this year was a walk in the park…very relaxing, very enjoyable.
We had the Koleda singers through on Christmas Eve, which was a great experience for my guests
The snow stopped, but the temperatures got colder and colder and what you’re seeing on these trees is, in fact, frost
how beautiful does that look. and I have a little fir tree at my front door and when the frost settled on it, it looked like I’d sprayed it with pretend snow….. 
Cold but beautiful…and a real experience for two young Aussie lads with little or no experience or what can only be called, a ‘real winter.’
We headed in Yambol just before New Years and the boys were treated to more Koleda singers who John just couldn’t resist getting involved with
My winter was made just that little bit warmer with the arrival of my very dear friend, Deb Westerberg, from her much warmer home in the South of France. When she decided to come visit the weather was certainly forecast to be cold and snowy, but I don’t think either of us realised just what the words ‘cold and snow’ really meant……
I arranged to meet Deb in Varna, so boarded the train and headed down there. I had found a hotel on the internet that I told Deb we just HAD to stay in. Why ??… because it was called the ‘ Hotel Perfect’ and I figured that we needed to find out just how perfect it was. What can I say….it was actually a most gorgeous place, very reasonably priced and slap bang in the centre of the Old Town. We were actually in stitches about this almost cheap ‘luxury’ place that we were staying is…and yes, we were so impressed, we took pictures…
We had a luxury apartment each and Deb’s had a terrace big enough to throw a very large BBQ on…a thought for summer perhaps
Anyway, we had a night in Varna and spent time wandering around having a look..and it has to be said, this is one town that really knows what the term ‘Christmas lighting’ means..the place looked fabulous, a real picture
and I have to thank Deb for the Varna pics….dunderhead here wandered out without her camera when we went to look at the lights and I was also too lazy to tidy up my room to take pictures of it…so the nice tidy room you’re seeing was Debs !!
We made our way back to Yambol the next day noting that the temperatures did seem a tad warmer than Varna..just a tad. A precurser to snow perhaps ?? oh yes indeedy !!
So, Deb came all the way to Bulgaria and basically spent the whole time snowed in here……and to add to her holiday, the power went off for three days !!! So, we had heating in the big lounge room and a gas hob to cook on…but that was it. no electric blankets, no hot water and Deb, John and Roy were sleeping upstairs, an area we were keeping warm with, yep, you guessed it, electric heaters !!! It was a bloody miserable couple of days and there was great celebration and much showering in the pink palace when the power was restored.
It has to be said though, it’s certainly been a much warmer winter in this house than my first one, when the weather was pretty similar to this, so malko po malko (little by little) I may, one day, get this house warm….ish
Anyway, our next challenge was to get Deb, John and Roy out of Miladinovtsi so they could catch their respective planes to their respective countries……..We got Dimitor, the lovely taxi driver, to brave the roads and come and get us for a trip to Yambol to organise train tickets. After my accident in similar weather conditions in 2005, I am just too scared to drive on ice, so the responsibility fell to Dimitor, a man I trust and a man with far more experience on icy roads than me. It was still a very scary trip in and took over an hour, but he drove so carefully and got us there safely. We also organised for him to return on the Saturday to get Deb on the train and to return on Sunday to get the boys into Yambol for their train. We’re talking appalling road conditions here, basically kilometres of packed down ice, but he came through for everyone and got them all where they needed to be in plenty of time to get to where they were going…. a good lad and totally reliable.
And so everyone has departed and I had a lovely time with them here, especially Deb….But, Oh, my house is Sooooo quiet with their departure ……..
The conditions are still pretty grim. Temperatures have fallen into the minus 13 to 15 range but so far, I’ve managed to stop any pipes from freezing. The roads are still a nightmare, but the temperatures are rising …slowly…but now we seem to be encased in a very thick fog……but the house is reasonably warm and the electricity has stayed on since those unfortunate three days that it was off….
And in between all of this, has been these
They just get cuter and cuter….and bigger and bigger !!!
My love affair with them is ongoing and every day they bring me a lot of amusement..they are still my ‘fat bottomed girls’
and I just love them to bits…..
and as they grow more and more adventurous, the fun they provide grows bigger and bigger. They are truly hilarious in the slippery, icy conditions and it’s very funny when they disappear into snow way deeper than they are tall.
I certainly don’t want three great hulking Karakachans gallumping around the yard in the future, but it’s going to be a very sad day when I say goodbye to Rosa and hand her over to Ivan……
I guess that’s about all there is for now…though I do have one more little thing to show you. Some of you may remember a very long time ago I talked about a ‘cart’ I had seen in the village of Rosa, a cart with a difference as it was the arse end of an old Trebent car that had been converted. I remember kicking myself because I didn’t have my camera with me that day. Well, the gods have smiled upon me. Just before Christmas I was driving into Yambol…with my camera in my bag and, Voila !! look what was coming down the road towards me
Brilliant !!!!
and on that note, I’ll wish you all Chestita Nova Godina ( Happy New Year)
May you all have a safe, happy and prosperous 2008….
Related posts:
- Snow……and even more snow
- The First Snow
- Babies, builders, burning sun & bloody fab veges
- Quietness,guests, snow & lists
- Family, Friends & Snow
