Dog rescue and Baba Marta

Sean, that's wonderful! I'm so glad you had a fab time, and PTL that you were able to help that dog.

We had Baba Marta in England, but I'll be travelling to our Bulgarian house in a couple of weeks. Our household includes six crazy special needs rescue cats, so one of us always needs to stay with them. And hubby doesn't cope well with being alone, meaning the longest I can leave him for is a week.

Because life got complicated last year I haven't been back since August - left the place with open windows and the water on, intending to return in a couple of weeks! Then my elderly cat got sick and hubby's mother broke her hip, and that was the end of any more travel plans. Thankfully my neighbour, who I gave a door key, went in and closed the windows, turned off the water, and drained the water system before the weather got cold. I expect to have to deal with serious weeds and plenty of cobwebs and dust, but hopefully no bigger issues like broken windows and water leaks.

If possible, my goal for this trip is to support the local furniture shop in the nearby small town by ordering my kitchen cabinets and appliances there. Also hoping that with it being spring, the builder's merchant will be willing to give me a better price on the wood-burning cooking stove I want! It will be nice to finally have a proper kitchen rather than the temporary set up in the front room!

@janemulberry - That's great news that things are finally moving forward for you, especially after going through the mill with life at home. Slow progress is better than no progress, pretty sure you'll find a deal, they seem to like a good haggle over here 😉

I've seen those petchka stoves selling between 199. - 499 leva, dunno bout you but for £200 or less seems amazing value for the heat they produce. On the point of kitchens and petchka, not sure if you know this already but a couple days ago, I was told if you speak to your local mayor... he or she will put in an order for your annual wood supply? They also give discounts for people of pension age.

Amazing what you learn down the pub in Bulgaria 🤣

Anyways best wishes, look forward to reading about your adventures in the coming weeks

@S25 - Sean

That sounds busy and fun.

We are flying over Sunday and will do some exploring of VT initially, then some house hunting to see if we think we will like it here. Wish I found the language easier, finding it more difficult than Greek 😂

I will keep an eye out for your channel. I only watch YT or Netflix, occasionally French TV via VPN.

@jeanmandredeix

Good luck for Sundays trip!!

Something I completely missed (and regret) you might want to visit. There's an old town area of the city in VT, which kept all its traditional old architecture with wooden fronted buildings, quaint cobbled streets and hide away cafes, bars and shops. It's not a place for a property hunt but it looks like nice place to unwind for a few hours out of the hustle & bustle of heavy traffic and concrete tower blocks.

Hope you find your new house. I believe if you managed to cope with the French and their funny quirky attitudes you will love how friendly and laid back the Bulgarians are.

It took me a few days to ignore the dilapidated buildings mixed with new, the wierd code language written on everything... but in all, if you use a translation app with mobile data switched on, people will certainly help you no matter where you go or what problem you encounter finding or understanding things.

My second trip ended today and this past week was so much easier. I'm sure you'll have a great time 🤩