Bulgaria, Munich and home

Our last day in the Balkans involved an early wakeup in Skopje and a four-hour drive over the border into the mountains of Bulgaria. This is where the 10th-century Monastery of Saint John of Rila is located deep up the Rila river valley surrounded by nature.

Then it was just an hour or so drive to Sofia to return our car rental. After we returned the car and checked into our final hotel we set off on the metro for a final look at Sofia. Another early wakeup for our flight home, we had to be at Sofia airport at 4am for our 6am flight to Munich.

Once in Munich, we had time to spare so set off on the train to the centre of the old town, Marienplatz. I had been here before in 1996, but since then have transited Munich on three occasions, once by plane, once by train, and once by automobile.

After the Balkans, I was struck by how easy travel in Germany is, everything is very efficient, and there are sufficient signs which make getting around incredibly easy.

The Balkans was a great trip, we logged over 4000km in the car and about 250km on foot. Entered nine countries and passed made ten border crossings. I’ve waited a long time to visit the Balkans for a number of reasons, logistics of visiting the area has been difficult and still is, but it’s far easier than it used to be.

Renting a car to cross borders there is a challenge. If you rent from country A, you can go to country B, but not country C. It’s very complex and it’s the reason we landed and rented from Bulgaria. There is a small rental car company there that specializes in Balkan travel and they issue you a laminated card that you hand to the customs agent at each border. This along with our Canadian passports made the crossings a breeze. Who knows what’s on the card, it was all in Cyrillic, but it worked.

You have currency issues, one nations' currency is completely useless in the next, in some cases, they won't even exchange it even at a poor rate. The best thing to do is have some euros and only exchange what you think you’ll need for that country. This is only a guess and you can never get it right, but I would get a little more than I thought I needed and then fill up the gas tank near the border to get rid of the cash I had before it was rendered useless in the next country. Another issue is a phone plan. Natasha was able to use an esim that worked in the entire region, we’d cross the border and after a minute or two, her phone continued to work. I didn’t bother because I don’t care that much to be connected.

I was careful to select Munich airport and Sofia with all the travel chaos. We never checked a bag and avoided the worst airports. Everything couldn’t have gone any smoother for us. Thanks to all who followed us along, we’re happy to be home and look forward to our next adventure.