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Headed to Trigrad, Bulgaria to meet Pri Mama Zarka, the owner of a Bed and Breakfast there. SAN had stayed here multiple times when visiting Bulgaria. You can read her stories on her site, but I wanted to meet this woman and her father. I went to Trigrad, a fairly small village in a beautiful mountain area. I asked various people where her place was, as Google Maps sent me to the wrong location. These people sent me all over, with some people waiving in one direction, some in another. I eventually found a person who called a young lady over who spoke English. It turns out Mama Zarka was in London, so some people were waiving to where her place was, some to where they thought London was, and some just waiving "away". I was sorry I missed her, but I found another BnB across the street.
REALITY CHECK
Lying down typing in a nice big comfortable bed in a nice room with private bath. Still, I was complaining to myself that there is no desk in the room to type at, and that the internet resets about every 20 minutes due to a power glitch causing a minute or two where it does not work.
Then I remember that this is a $12 room. A great dinner down the street was $7 with tip. I opted for the $12 room with a big bed rather than the $10 room with two small beds mainly because it had a private bath. I will probably use $9 worth of electricity for hot water and heating the room. And coffee and danish in the morning is included.
Yup, check reality before you complain.
My first night here I asked a young person if there was a restaurant in town. She waived vaguely towards the town center. I eventually found a tiny place, that did not look like much, but it had a wood stove running on this cold evening, and according to the girl I asked it was the only restaurant within walking distance. It was fantastic. Had some of the best chicken soup ever.
Up the street there was a hotel with another restaurant. Asking young people for help is always risky but they are the only ones in this part of Bulgaria that are almost guaranteed to speak some English. I walked into this one the next evening. There were no tables available, so some guy asked me to sit down. He was there with his wife Liana. That is the only name of the people that I met today that I will attempt to spell. I sat down and we had a conversation about motorcycles. Yup, bikers everywhere are friendly. Later, a couple came in, and could not find a seat. Well, they sat down, but before they did I had to ask them if I knew them. It turns out that I had taken their photo earlier. We were both at the Eagle's Rocks, a few hours drive away, and we took photos for each other. What a coincidence. Then a couple of brothers came in, they sat down as well. Now it was a party. Well, there was very little drinking, but we had a good time. The brothers were also motorcyclists. Great time. Bulgarians are a friendly people.
One of the things I like to do sometimes is just randomly follow signs to tourist destinations. Sometimes I find the coolest places, like Eagle's Rocks
Other times, I ride up a road and find I am at the birth place of Orpheus.
Then continue on to where the site is supposed to be. I follow a goat trail that makes me wonder if I will be able to get out of there. Then I see a sign for the site that says 100 meters up this road. I go up said horribly rutted path through a field. Barely making it to the top. Where there is another sign saying 100 meters to go, pointing to where I just came from. Or when we were riding in Lithuania and followed Google to where a stone tablet was supposed to be. Instead we found a bunch of beehives and a woman tending them.
A friend gave me various routes that I could follow to stay on fun roads with good scenery. Some of these used tourist spots as route guides. One place I stopped was Devils Bridge - This was a fun route on the bike as the path leading to it got worse and worse, eventually ending on these stones, spaced just right that my front and rear tires would get stuck at the same time. I eventually dropped the bike here. That's what I get for playing on the rocks.
Always fun to ride on this stuff with a heavy bike. 
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I loved this poster. Roughly translated, with my poor memory, it reads: You buy Potatoes from Norway, you buy tomatoes from Poland, you buy Garlic from Romania. Screw you, I am planting Marijuana." Many Bulgarian Pensioners are growing Cannabis for cash.
