Day 15 - Видин до Θεσσαλονίκη 16 - Σεπτέμβριος 2019

Day 15 - Vidin to Thessaloniki - 16 September 2019

#Видин #София #Θεσσαλονίκη #България #Bulgaria #Greece #Thessaloniki #Ελλάδα

Early morning departure

Ugh, the alarm went off at 03:30, worse still the reception in the hotel didn't have breakfast for us. In video station the train come early, but just to be sure we actually moved carriages to be towards the front of the train. At ten beginning of the journey it was not so crowded, but gradually filled up later. We left Vidin at 04:50 in the morning and it was still dark. I fell asleep and woke myself up with a loud snort. For the rest of the journey I took pictures, made films, and slept again. Finally we made it to Sofia. We throw the bags in the left luggage and got straight for coffee. For breakfast I got кашкавалка a cheese roll for one lev.

Sofia

Firstly we needed to find post office. Second a supermarket. Okay, Google-maps GO! The post office was just an admin building. Next a run down residential area next to the prison. There was a long line of people getting unemployment and pension money. We were queuing wrong! Inside it was our turn. Buying stamps is a bit of a ceremony. It is first logged on the computer, the postcards get a rubber stamp..... Mission accomplished Благодаря!

Metro Station in Sofia

We walked to a supermarket and got pita bread, salad, nuts, water, bananas and tuna. It was going to be a long journey! We went back to the station, we waited for the train. Коловоз 3з Запада!

New friends on the train

On heb platform we made friends, Eléonora (France), Will and Hanna from the UK. We chatted all the way to the border at Kulata. There was some nice scenery. We had our packed lunch around 17:00. At Kulata a rather angry looking border guard from Bulgaria ushered us off the train to an awaiting friendly Greek man who looked like my favourite Greek chef from Weert. He drove the minibus to the border, Stanislav got a nice reaction because of his name. I joked that the vehicle was "transport fluid" actually not a bus but a train!

Sunset at Strimon in Greece

In Strimon there was a beautiful small station with flowers, the sun was just setting and the other travellers got out guitars and other musical instruments and started singing. Travellers from Croatia, German and Sweden joined us. We talked, and the music played, the sun turned dark red and the sky was on fire!

Friendly dogs

A couple of happy dogs said hello. The sun went down and the mosquitoes arrived. Finally in the dark the train guard was yelling at using Greek. In the distance a flickering light was approaching. We stood and waited on a tiny crumbling platform, the likes I have seen in Croatia and in Serbia. Suddenly the atmosphere changed when we got on. Lots of immigrants from Asia were staring at us. At 23:30 we arrived in Thessaloniki. Eléonora was waiting for us and like a switch started blabbing again incessantly. We walked towards the hotel, she was still talking on and on about all kinds of things and nobody was listening. Finally we arrived! Silence! Καληνυχτα!

In a word: #ταξίδι