Bansko 2007

Time for a change, so this year we're in Bansko. Once again thanks to Stu for keeping note of everything, his comments are in italics.

Saturday - An evening with puppets.

All change this year indeed, the first being that we're not going to Manchester, in fact we're not leaving Scotland at all, just heading across to Edinburgh in the morning.

Also, instead of getting the Bulgarian flu, Stu has instead already got a Scottish version that he's taking over with him. I drive across for him, and I notice his green hair. He's got green hair. We grab some supplies in a supermarket, then back to mine for a few beers and Team America (because we'd first seen it in Zac's bar, Borovets two years ago) then Borat to get into the Eastern European mood. The holiday has officially begun. And Stu has green hair.

Sunday – A shock at Plovdiv, weird cheeseburgers and an encounter with the Balkan Horn

Up and awake about 7.30am and Stu is blowing snot everywhere, although it's not the only thing that's green. Did I mention he has green hair?

He's dyed it for the holiday and it looks fantastic, but he's getting some looks! He downs a few beers in Edinburgh to calm his nerves. The flight stops off in Newcastle on the way to Plovdiv so we’re barely in the air before we come down again, meaning the fasten seat belt lights are off for a nano-second. It’s Stu’s turn to be bursting for pee, but this time we can’t ask the driver to pull over. His bladder almost exploded during the descent into Newcastle but just, just managed to hold on.

We land on the first attempt this year,only 2 hours and 50 minutes after leaving Newcastle, but we still felt like keeping up the tradition of buying a mini vodka from that wee shop in Plovdiv Airport for the transfer. We were on the verge of tears as we discover it's closed! Disaster.

One hour into the three hour transfer we stop at a petrol station with an attached mini-mart, and things improve dramatically. Stu comes back grinning with a bottle of something clear with what I’m sure is a Government Health Warning on it.

“Stu, what’s Bulgarian for ‘go blind’?”

“Nastravi!”

I have a tiny shot of it from the lid and immediately stagger back, almost into the road as a huge bus steams past. It beeps and we notice it's from a company called ‘The Balkan Horn’ and as fans of Derek and Clive, this cracks us up.

A few shots later and we're another hour into the journey. This time the stop is in the middle of nowhere, just a toilet and some stray dogs. I go off and share my crisps with them as Stu chills the bottle of 'scary' in a small patch of snow. The first snow we've seen so far in fact. It's a topic on everyone’s lips, the worrying snow reports and web cam images of the past few weeks, we'll just have to pray that the snow gods like us.

Green hair and sore back

The only good news we get is from the rep, and that’s just to point out a typo in our welcome packs. We pick up our lift passes in the Happy End at 8.30am, not 6.30am as we’d just read. We both say, ‘thank fuck!’ at this, then immediately feel really bad when we realise there’s a small kid within earshot. Then feel better when we arrive, as his dad stands up, bangs his head, and says something that shocked even us.

Hotel Mura and hairy man

Stu now does something remarkable as we arrive and check into the Mura. He picks up the wrong case and walks upstairs with it, next to someone else from the bus, who, to be fair, has been drinking a lot more than us. This guy gets to his room, says thanks to Stu, takes the case off him and disappears through the door. Stu stands there for a moment, thinking this guy has just done the most audacious bit of luggage snatching, then realises what he’s done and belts back down to reception where luckily his own case is still sitting. I’m already in the shower, and still laughing, when he gets in.

"GOOD EVENING BANSKO!" Washed, changed, and a few welcome drinks to the better we hit the town. Arriving a bit addled in a foreign country is hard on the nerves at the best of times, but especially so when it’s very quiet with no apparent signs of life. Anywhere. We wander about looking up dark streets. After Borovets, the size of Bansko takes a bit of getting used to.

It’s an actual town. I don’t know why that surprised us, but it did. Borovets is pub, pub, strip joint, pub, hotel, restaurant, pub. This is street after street of darkness. We eventually find signs of life but it’s all a bit low key. There was no welcome meal so we were starving and eventually found a food stall with lights on. We asked for what we thought was a cheeseburger each, but what we got was two toasted buns with cheese. This place will take a bit of getting used to.

First impressions seem a little negative. Where is everything! Pubs? Food?

Monday - A missing snowboarder, giant purple cows and the aptly named Amnesia bar

Up with a jump and a song at 7.30....no hold on reverse that. We’re a bit worse for wear, so it’s more of a fall out of bed than a jump and really more of a groan than a song. Got our stuff together, missed breakfast (a recurring theme) and headed down to the lobby to catch the 8.30 bus which we missed too.

A taxi gets us to the Happy End where we meet our reps and get our lift passes, then we nip round the corner to find breakfast. We get a hot dog stall and a coffee kiosk. That'll do fine. The first proper food we’ve had in 24 hours or so and the coffee was like rocket fuel. We've perked right up, in fact thanks to the coffee we’re wired to the moon, so we head straight up the hill. There are no queues whatsoever, as we’ve been expecting from reading the forums on skidvd and bulgariaski, so we surprisingly walk straight on and get a pod to ourselves.

When we get out at the other side Stu is jumped on by a big green frog, the last thing you want to see at that time of the morning, especially wandering around hugging people. Apparently Stu’s green hair had attracted it. Like a red rag to a bull, green hair to a frog.

Stu found his group and I hung around in the background, warming up on the small green run they were using. We arranged to meet at 12 back at the gondola as I head off to find something a bit steeper.

Stu - After a few runs my instructor moved me up into the intermediate group. I was starting to find my snowboarding legs again, mind you the front-side 9's will have to wait till the end of the week (cough). We were heading onto the chair lift when I spotted TK finishing the blue run beside it but he didn’t hear me shouting or spot me waving frantically at him. We go for a run down the same blue run that TK had just completed and half way down our instructor spots a natural hit and goes for a jump over it. The only thing I saw after his board left it was a flurry of snow and two ski's flying through the air. He’d hit a kid who had stopped and was resting on the blind side of it ... thankfully he was perfectly fine, but we take this to mean we’re having a lunch break now.

Where the fuck is he?

Stu - Ah this is what life is all about, snowboarding with a nice group of people from all corners of the earth, bright sunshine, beers, and a really good laugh.

Seriously, where is he?

Stu - We eventually called it a day at 2.15 even though the group was supposed to end at 12. I headed down the gondola and I suddenly developed a weird fascination with the big inflatable pink Milka cow tethered outside the Grand Kemprinski hotel, as we find out later.

If he’s fallen and hurt himself I’ll kill him.

Stu - Headed back to the hotel at around 4.30 as TK was getting ready to call mountain rescue. He really thought I had fallen off the mountain or had been attacked by a bear and that I would be heading home in a shoe box. I’ve never seen anyone look so relieved. Feeling guilty for about 0.5 seconds, I headed to bed for a wee sleep.

Git!

All told we’ve actually both had a great first days riding, which in our experience is always a good thing, as Stu says, if you have a bad first day it can colour the rest of the week (see the report from Borovets 2005). We attend the welcome meeting at the Hotel Bansko and book both the pub crawl and the pizza ‘n’ party night; unfortunately this meant Stu couldn’t meet his snowboarding group for their very own pub crawl tonight, hopefully another night though.

Stu - Nope, never saw them again!

Dinner tonight was in the Mura restaurant, chicken burger with really weird chips, then out for the pub crawl. Another major difference with Borovets and Pamporovo is that you need a bus to do this. First stop is the Happy End and find the free glass of wine rather disgusting. We set the tone by having a few beers instead. We wrote our names down on paper, which was challenging enough, and handed them to Lou “How do you do” our rep from down Newcastle way.

We all stood up on a chair and introduced ourselves to each other, and then Lou gathered us round a big log. Turns out that this is the first game, a race to see who could hammer a nail into a tree stump the quickest. Yup that’s correct, hammering a nail into a log. Stu lost to a Dutch guy. We had another beer or two while others played at arm wrestling down the other end of the pub, the winner got a free shot and a sore arm.

In the unknown Mehana

We get bussed to the second pub, the Friendly Bar, a lovely place with a good acoustic band on called the Snowdogs, another free drink then a few beers again, obviously. More games with Stu trying to tell me the names of songs with a mouthful of ice cubes. Didn't have a clue. Stu's very disappointed as he says he usually talks like that when pissed.

Bus again to the Lion Bar, where outside three people play Kamenitza Russian roulette. Three cans are taken away, one shaken violently, then the three players have to open their chosen can directly under their face. A few of us manage to get wet, and then head inside. Damn it’s busy. With Sky Sports and what looks like a Brits abroad menu, it’s a popular pub. I’m not knocking it, we ate and drank there a few times during the week, but it's not what you'd call ethnic.

Back on the pub crawl and onto pub four (and neither of us can remember the name). This was a more traditional Mehana, and empty except for the staff and us. We were split into two teams, table 1 and table 2 and had various contests, mainly involving dancing. We get involved in a conga type thing around the pub and out into the street. Then back to the bus.

..thinking I can dance.

We disembark and we hit (almost literally) the fifth place called "Amnesia". Another few drinks and I start to think I can dance… time to call it a night. We’re a few sheets to the wind as we walk out of Amnesia and through the town square. Stu thinks it’d be a great photo opportunity if I have carnal relations with the big rock, fountain thing. At that point in time I thought it a capital idea. Of course I fell off, got very wet, and Stu, gawd bless him, took photos.

I'll just sleep here.

Tuesday - Ignorant skiers, bad leg burn, more liver punishment and a lack of patience.

Stu - Thank goodness I’m writing all this down as neither of us can remember much from last night, and TK is still in bed gibbering. My call of "Oi, you coming out today?" was met with something incoherent of which I made out the word ‘later’. I jumped onto the bus, well slumped really, and headed up to the gondola. Got off the other end at 9.30 and I couldn’t find my snowboarding group. Also, there’s no green frog today, which is nice, but just as I’m relaxing fucking Spiderman jumps out at me.

By the way, the green frog and Spiderman and various other outfits are worn by guys who wander round so you can have photos taken with them, photos that they later try and sell you ... they do it at Borovets too. So, no, these were not random hallucinations we were having.

Not happy. My group are nowhere to be seen. I was supposed to meet them last night but it conflicted with the Balkan pub crawl, but damn it I had forgotten to ask them where and when for this morning. I’ll stay around here, near the gondola station, and keep my eyes peeled.

Boarder without a group

I muster up the energy for a warm up run down the green near the gondola but as I stand waiting, skiers are trying to shove me out of the way to get to the poma lift even though I’m next in line. Am I invisible or something? Get your god dam skis off my board before I rip your spleen out. I really don’t mind at all that you’re scratching my top sheet. Now both TK and I can ski …
Shush!

… but the arrogance of these people. Just as bad at the top as they stand in front of me as I try to start riding. This is turning out to be a really bad morning, and the old leg burn is starting to make itself felt, so I head back down to get food and find TK.

Via the walkie talkies Stu finds me in the Lion bar having a pick-me-up. Climbing fountains aside, I wasn't that bad last night but my head has other ideas. Stu eventually talks me into going up the gondola though, for lunch at the top. Sausage and cold chips, and it costs a fortune, but it works wonders. We have a few runs until Stu's legs start hurting and I start swearing at my bindings.

Stu goes off down the gondola and I race him on the ski road which is board-able but icy. I come a cropper on a fast wee bit and bang down hard, thank goodness I’ve bought a helmet this year. Still smarts a bit though. I tenderly make it to the bottom in one piece, meet up with Stu and we go binding shopping. I’ve just bought a new set of Flow’s and I’m having no end of problems with them. My last set were fine but getting past it, but this set just never seem to feel right. In the shops, the bindings are all either plastic rubbish or too expensive, so I reluctantly decide to leave it and soldier on with them. Really envy Stu who had problems with Flow bindings of his own on a trip to Glencoe and ‘flung them to hell’ as he says. Flow step-in bindings, you either love them or hate them.

Back for a quick snooze, and head out for dinner up town. We find Amigos bar, which was to become our local as we both think it reminds us a bit of Franco's in Borovets. Have a pizza and a few beers, then onto Friendly’s, for a stupidly expensive vodka red bull or two (tip, always ask for local Vodka in there or you’ll get the imported expensive stuff). Happy End bar is closed, so finish the night in the Lion.

Stu’s throat is getting very sore, a combination of flu, smoke and shouting above music, so we head home for our early night, at 4am!

Wednesday - Fire, gambling, and weird hot dogs

In a reverse of yesterday I’m off and out while Stu rests his throat, legs and other sore bits. Get breakfast and hit the slopes, but the lack of snow is having a real effect by now. More icy patches than snow, so I spend most of the day on the blue run that goes 6, 4 and 1 on the piste map. It’s in the shade, has snow cannons, and is the only decent run still operating, so it gets a bit busy too.

The open run!

Meet up with some of the Dutch people from the pub crawl and have, surprisingly enough, a moderately priced and very tasty meal up the mountain, a slice of pizza from a kiosk outside one of the pubs, near the big yellow prefab pub.

Cheap Pizza's to the right ...

The sun is shining, had a few great runs and I’m well fed. Is nice. Take the ski road back down and have a nice run, interrupted only by a bloody text message from work!

We went for dinner at the Ethno Restaurant tonight. ‘Weird Blanket Man’, (as Stu dubbed him), who stands outside, has enticed us in. We get chatting to him and he’s a really nice guy, and the food’s not bad too. We had barbecued pork and barbecued stuffed chicken with veal, bacon and cheese, with mashed potatoes mixed with herbs and feta cheese. Great stuff... we waited a while for it, but it was worth it. The music was a bit grating after a while, but it was full of locals which is always a good sign. Nice hot wine too.

Off to Amigos and the bar staff are in a frisky mood. We let them choose our drinks for a few rounds, and they always seemed to involve noise and fire. Some ungodly cocktails that come with instructions. “Ok, when I blow the whistle he’ll light it, then you put in the straw and start drinking” What?! As we started drinking out of the glass, which was now on fire, the barman poured in a huge shot of Bailey’s. Very nice, and strong as hell! Gawd bless Bulgaria.

Amigo's Barmen

The barman then poured lighter fluid in a trench along the bar and set it on fire and he lit cigarettes with a can of hairspray he ignited. We loved it.

Then there was the gambling with the customers… and of course we had a go. The way it works is that whoever rolls the highest number from 2 dice loses and buys the shots. The barman lost 3 times and we got 3 free shots! But you always quit when you’re ahead.

Go back via the place we’d bought food from on the first night, and ask very clearly for a ‘Hot Dog’. We get a toasted roll with salad and peas! Peas! Who puts peas in a roll? Wander back to the hotel around 1 a.m., debating if they’re taking the piss.


Thursday - A lifties wrath and pasta la pizza baby.

Still no fresh snow, and one thing we’ve noticed, no maid service to speak of yet this week. We’re running out of toilet roll and there’s a big mucky patch near the door where we’ve been leaving our boots (another side effect from the lack of snow). The sun is shining again today, and the wind has really picked up.

Breakfast in the hotel is the typical Bulgarian fare… sausage with the texture of cake, weird cold meats and cheeses. We have lots of coffee and fruit juice. Stu’s not looking his best this morning as we get the bus up to the Happy End, then the gondola to the top. He wants to have another coffee and while in one of the pubs up the mountain he disappears to be noisily ill in the toilet a few times. He’s not feeling too perky at all, but wants to carry on boarding that wee green for a bit.

Reassured that he's going to be okay I leave Stu to the queue jumpers on the green and head off to explore. I take a chairlift up, and then get in another which has a pull down Perspex bubble … (for lighting cigarettes in the wind I assume!) The views are incredible but it’s all rocks and tree stumps. The big blue at the top is a solid ice mogul field that I have a bit of difficulty navigating, so I make my way back down again on the chair. It’s a hairy trip as I’m not the best with heights and I’m facing the wrong way, i.e. down the hill, but I hold on and shut my eyes.

I join Stu again at the bottom and have a go at adjusting his bindings, then go up the green with him to see if there’s an improvement. Whilst in the queue, a little scamp on skis keeps trying to get past me. I tell him a number of times that there’s a queue, but at the corner he slips on by, only to be grabbed by the liftie and have a few strips torn off. Very satisfying.

Tinkering

Stu - The binding adjustment seems to have helped and I have a few good runs before the batteries in my mp3 player pack in. We decide to call it a day and start off down the ski road. Unfortunately, the old leg burn kicks in, so I turn back and walk to the gondola. I’ve lost TK as the last I saw was him flying down it, carving like a demon and trying to light a cigarette at the same time (he makes it look so easy). We meet at the bottom and head to the Happy End for a beer, and then I decide to box the udders of the Milka cow for a while. TK takes photos and we notice clouds creeping in which we hope is a good sign.

Green haired udder boxer

After a wee kip we head out again for the Balkan quiz in Amigos. We’ve miss-timed and are an hour early, but no matter. Pasta la Pizza baby becomes the war cry of the quiz as we have a pizza and get many questions wrong. Our consolation prize is Lou signing some Tom Jones songs (apparently what he used to do before becoming a rep). We get talked into some shots by the barman, but head home before it starts getting silly. But only just!

Friday – A cow gets violated, terror on the gondola and a rubber dildo

Get some hot dogs and strong coffee inside us for the trip up the gondola late next morning. On the way up something weird happens. I stand up to get something out my backpack and Stu shouts something. Apparently the wire had lost a bit of tension and we dropped about 6 feet. Stu nearly shat himself, but I missed the whole thing because I was moving around.

It’s very icy down at the bottom of the mountain, so after just one or two wee warm runs up we head for Blue 6. At the top we watch people tackling the top of the bone rattling black run, The Tomba. There must be a race coming up as they’re building a grandstand at the bottom, and grooming it a bit more than usual. We play around a lot, having a lot of gentle runs down blue 6 and the surrounding runs and having a nice relaxing morning. Back to that pizza stall for lunch then do the same in the afternoon. Again, we split up for the trip down, me taking the road, Stu the gondola.

Ski buses at the Happy End

Meet at the Happy End for a drink and some food, and then on leaving Stu decides he needs a photo of him trying to shag the big Milka cow. Yes, he was trying to climb the cow so we could get a photo of him taking it from behind. He’s had around half a pint all day too. Back to the hotel, but not before he bursts his back pack trying to climb it one last time!

Stu’s still not well, what with the head cold and trying to hump inflatables, so he heads off for a nap. I go downstairs into the Mura’s health centre for a massage and a long dip in the Jacuzzi. Bliss.

This is the 26th day so far without snow. Borovets and Pamporovo are apparently worse off than Bansko, so I suppose we are lucky in a way, but it’s still heartbreaking only having a small part of the resort to play on. But as we head out for the night, we can feel immediately that the temperature has dropped a lot and it was starting to get very, very windy. Hopefully a good sign.
(Turns out it was, but not for us. The snowfall happened about a week later and went on for so long that Balkan extended their season for another fortnight. Been a weird year like that all over Europe apparently.)

The Happy End is a lot busier tonight, with a band on, and lots of people up dancing. There are also some dancers in cages. We try to look at the female ones whilst ignoring the guys.

Off down to Amigo’s for more fiery drinks, where we find an ice cube fight going on, and a rubber dildo being passed around the female drinkers, who could suck it for a free drink. Loud music, laughs and at one point a boat horn. There’s a conga line going in and out of the pub, and a microphone is being passed around so we can join in with the songs being played. This place can be weird, but what an atmosphere. On leaving at silly o'clock in the morning we find a crepe stall! Where have you been all week!


Saturday to Sunday - The near ruination of a wedding, Ugly scenes at plovdiv airport

Despite last night’s shenanigans, we’re up and raring to go for our last day on the slopes, having a coffee in the Mura waiting for the 10.30 ski bus. We’re wondering why no-one else is in ski or board gear just as we’re told that last night a tree blew over onto the gondola wire, knocking it out of action for a day. We toy with the idea of getting a taxi up, but every driver we ask quotes something like 50lev each way, with no guarantee that the chairs and buttons will be operational.

We give up and retire the boards for another year, then wander up town for a bite to eat. The Milka cow has either blown away, burst or been taken down … either way, Stu is gutted. Ah, holiday romance.

We have a respectful look around the heritage centre in the centre of the old town and take some arty photos of the wood sculptures in the garden, then some funny ones of us pretending to use the wooden toilet.

Blearghh

We then have a look round the church, mingling with some tourists who seem rather well dressed. Fuck, we’ve wandered into a wedding. We high tail it out, and meet the bride coming in!

The Holy Trinity Church in Bansko ... they do weddings

Get some really angry looks, but also get out alive, so there’s a bonus. Head to the Happy End and meet some skiers who managed to get up the hill. One guy has really ripped salopetes, his arm in a sling and a large bandage on his face. Looks like he had a fight with a tree, and the tree won. We’re quite glad we didn’t make it up today now.

The transfer bus leaves at 4 in the morning, so not much point in going to bed. We visit the Lion Bar and Amigo's one last time before boarding for the three and a half hour ride to Plovdiv.

We get there and find that the plane is broke! A four hour delay due to technical problems. The airport staff open the doors so we can lounge on the grass outside and spend time sunbathing (it’s January!)

Sunbathing at Plovdiv

Then we have one of those annoying situations where the story keeps changing and the time keeps stretching out. The plane can’t be fixed so we’re getting you a new one, it’ll be here in an hour, in two hours, next week. You can use the 2 p.m. flight, no that one is going to Manchester. People were getting restless and some people were screaming down the phones to reps.

Talking to some people at the airport it seemed that even though we had problems with the snow conditions and therefore didn’t get much riding in, it was certainly more than people in Borovets and especially Pamporovo. We're lucky we got any riding in at all.

The Manchester flight comes in and the engineers set about it, comparing it to our broken plane. The people are arriving from the resorts to get on this plane back to Manchester but they make them wait for our plane that’s coming from London and divert this one to Humberside/Edinburgh. Finally we’re going home. Delay was somewhere between six and seven hours. Not the longest in the world (see Pamporovo report from 2004!) but damn annoying and typical of this week. Finally get to Edinburgh at 7 p.m. Absolutely shattered!

NOTES

Had this been out first time travelling to Bulgaria I doubt if I'd gone back and can really see where people who moan and complain on all the Bulgaria forums are coming from. The snow conditions were terrible, but as I've said we were lucky in comparison to some. Still a very meagre selection of runs to chose from.

Bansko's got a really great ski area, but I've still to sample it all ... it must have had a certain something though, as I'm heading back out in March 2010 ... I'll let you know what happens!