Sofia, Bulgaria

Such a romantic sounding capital city, and we did see a beautiful rainbow from our room.

However, the fairytale then fades, because the surrounding area is pretty run down, although clean and with lots of people around.

The bus from Ruse took about five hours and the rain poured down, and in a de ja vu from yesterday, we thought that it had
stopped, went out to explore and got soaked again.

They do have an excellent metro system, and our line is a tasteful mint green.

Just before the rain set in we managed to get a quick snap of the Patriarchal Church of Alexander Nevsky. 

Lots of people were going through the front door and we followed them in, just in time for the start of the service. 

It's a Bulgarian Orthodox Church and the Patriarch of the whole of Bulgaria conducted the service. His name is Danii and succeeded the previous Patriarch who died earlier this year.

He is right in the middle of the photo, has an amazing grey beard and carried a metal holder full of insense that he shook around him. He walked around the whole church, stopping at various icons to shake his holder, while a beautiful choir sang from a balcony high above us.

It was very beautiful and I feel privileged to have been there.

Bucharest to Ruse, Bulgaria

Arrived at Bucharest train station this morning and the timetable looks quite complicated.

Fortunately we had visited yesterday and already had our tickets.

We were travelling to just over the border in Bulgaria, and our carriage looked quite attractive with all of its graffiti.

Not so good from inside as it was difficult to see out of the window, and the ancient window also didn't open so it was also way too hot.

We had to stop at the border and the guard disappeared with our passports, and lots of other people's for nearly an hour, but eventually we got them back and the train finished its journey at Ruse.

Ruse is in Bulgaria and on the river Danube, and there is no other way of saying that the walk from the station to our room was a bit rough looking.

Later in the afternoon and in the middle of quite a violent thunderstorm,we set off to explore the town. 

It has some very dodgy areas, but also some glorious old buildings in need of a bit of care and attention.

Maybe also a change of colour.

Eventually we made it down to the Danube, which looked pretty grim in the rain, but then we found a riverside bar and things started to improve.

Once the rain slowed down other people appeared, and a Friday night vibe was possibly gradually making an appearance.

Found the town sign which is always a favourite of ours, and I have absolutely no idea why it says Pyce instead of Ruse.

After a very tasty meal at the Happy Bar we got back to our room and Darren made us both a coffee using the white liquid that I bought from the supermarket. I thought that it was milk, but surprise surprise, it tasted like vinegar.

I really don't think that Starbucks will start selling it anything soon.

Bucharest, Romania

We are currently staying with Darren's lovely cousin Melissa in her home on the outskirts of Bucharest.

Yesterday was a complete washout as it rained all day, so we stayed in and I made friends with Rio the dog, but annoyingly she much preferred Darren to me.

The weather was back to normal today so we set out on a massive tour of the capital.

We hopped off the bus and walked round a lake to the Arc de Triumph. This was built to commemorate Romania's victory in the first world war, and the traffic around it is as busy as its Parisian namesake.

Then we went to the Palace of Parliament, which is supposed to be the heaviest building in the world.

It has over 1,000 rooms and lots of them are absolutely unbelievably massive.

Apparently the dictator Nicholae Ceausescu visited North Korea in the 1950s and got the idea of creating an enormous building to show off his power and influence.

Almost all of the materials, and all of the workforce were Romanian, but the Communists were overthrown before it was finished so it was never used for its original purpose.

Today it seems that they can't think what to do with these massive rooms and corridors, so they are empty, but spotlessly clean.

Moving on towards the city centre I was very impressed with the ponds and fountains along the main road and in the middle of a huge roundabout.

All that I needed was a glass of wine and some peanuts and I could have spent the afternoon there.

Unfortunately there was not a bar nearby, but in the distance you can see the Palace of Parliament.

The rest of the day was spent wandering around Bucharest looking at beautiful buildings.

We also found a great spot along the river and I was very jealous of this bike.

Day out in Tirana

Good start to the day as we ran through the city centre to the artificial lake on the outskirts.

There is a 5k running and cycling route around it and the whole area is full of cafes and people relaxing.

It was a 10k run, I was really tired and hot by the end, but then we ran right past the hidden entrance to our hotel and an extra kilometre before we realised our mistake.

After a nice long break we then visited the Bunk Art 2.

This is a very strange and interesting place that tries to tell the story of the last 100 years in Albania.

It is set in an old underground nuclear bunker right in the centre of town, and was built in the 1960s.

The background to this is all the idea of the dictator Enver Hoxha, who ruled Albania from 1946 until his death in 1985.

He ruled with an iron fist and allowed no Albanians out of the country and almost no foreigners in. He turned the whole country into a police state and encouraged the citizens to spy on each other and report any transgressions.

There was lots of ingenious ways of spying, and this set up showed two neighbours with a hole drilled in the wall and listening and camera equipment to gather evidence.

Many thousands of people were tortured and murdered and an art installation showed a brain imprisoned within a barbed wire cage to show that no independent thoughts were allowed.

Enver Hoxha believed that all of the neighbouring countries were planning on invading and he had over 160,000 bunkers built all over the country. This one had a decontamination room that was extremely claustrophobic.

The military rule ended in 1991 and since then Albania has changed massively, but this exhibition wants everyone to look forward, but also to remember the past.

It was a relief to come back up into the fresh air and daylight again.

For dinner we decided to go to a restaurant that I saw yesterday, as I was impressed with the happy looking people drinking wine and watching the people pass by.

The menu looked a bit difficult and I chose ravioli while Darren went for sausage in cherry sauce. He did happen to notice that the menu used to have an s on the end of sausage, but that had been rubbed out.

Our wine arrived first and it was the smallest amount of wine in the largest glass that I have ever seen. Huge disappointment, but I sipped it slowly to try to make it last and then Darren's dinner arrived.

One small sausage in a very cherry sauce. Nothing else. It was quite funny really, but surely the waiter could have asked if he wanted anything else with it when he ordered??

Not our most successful meal, but we will be wiser next time.

Actually the photo makes it look bigger than it actually was.

I love T, where are we today?

First day of our latest holiday today, and where are we?

I am always a fan of the 'I love' signs, but I have never seen one that uses only the first letter. I could be in Turin, Toronto or even Taiwan, but actually it is Tirana in Albania. Not necessarily the first T that comes to mind.

We are in the main Skanderbeg Square, and they also have a very large flag, with the excellent national emblem.

The square is named after a 15th century hero, Gjergji Skanderbeg, who fought against the Ottoman empire.

We set off this morning at 2.30am, arriving in Tirana before noon, and after a quick nap at our hotel we set off to explore.

Tirana is a very compact capital city with lots of building work going on, and this incredible church was actually built in 2017.

This is just a random new tower block, but look closely and every balcony has two full sized trees on them. It looks good now, and hope that they all get enough water and grow well.

To be honest there aren't many stand out sights, but this is called the pyramid, and appears to be a building underneath with loads of steps on the outside rather than having a roof. Nice views from the top.

Finally for today, we had dinner in an area called the Castle. This is a bit of an exaggeration as there is almost no castle left standing, but there was lots of bars and restaurants and a lovely atmosphere with families promenading in the evening sunshine.

Marc Quinn at Kew Gardens

 Caught the train to London and then hopped on the Bromptons for the journey towards Kew. We stopped off at Hammersmith to catch a bit of Olympic coverage on a big screen.

This was a close up of a Chinese table tennis player.

Once at Kew we picked up a map and went to the superb Princess of Wales conservatory.

My absolute favourite area is the giant water lillies and an urban myth is that a small child can sit on a lily pad and it doesn't sink. We didn't see this theory being tested, but one of the gardeners was in the pond in waders doing maintenance and they piled their tools up on a pad and non of them got wet.

One of the lily ponds had a glass viewing window and there was gigantic fish swimming around underneath them. They looked at least four feet long, but it is possible that the glass was acting as a magnifier, or I could be exaggerating.

Back outside we passed a beautiful sculpture amongst the ferns, but it wasn't by Marc Quinn so we had to keep walking on.

Who is Marc Quinn you may be asking?

 Well he is a London based artist who - according to the brochure - is not easily categorised. This sort of build up is always a worry to me.

He has 17 sculptures all around the gardens, and they are all inspired by Kew's landscape and collections.

This one is outside the palm house and is a giant shiny palm leaf, and a giant red orchid was down by the pagoda.

He also sculpted four bonsai trees and 'imagined that they had been set free from the pruning and containment and were set free to reach their full height'.

So he sculpted two enormous bonsai plants, or maybe we should just call them trees, in nice bonsai style pots. 

Finally, five mirrored sculptures set in the gardens. These were the most fun and if you stood in the right place then you could get a nice selfie.

So overall, Marc added some extra interest to the trip, but really couldn't compare to the fantastic nature on display.