18 October 2023, Dupnitsa, 41.1km
Hotel Orenda 40lev [R400]

We hoped very much to spend the night at accommodation named Guest House Feel Yourself, but it was not to be...
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Over coffee with Viktor this morning, he told us that during the communist era, while all agricultural land had been nationalised, home ownership had remained private. Agricultural output had declined and after 1990 an attempt had been made to return land to the former owners, but "many people had died and over two million left Bulgaria as soon as they were allowed".
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We planned to visit the Stob pyramids en route Dupnitsa, so cycled 2km off our route to Stob village, only to find that both approaches to the pyramids (rock formations) were too time-consuming to be worth pursuing.
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In the village of Kocherinovo we bought banitsa for breakfast. This Bulgarian version of burek, is phyllo pastry stuffed with white cheese.
At Rila Monastery yesterday (did you see the exceptional frescoes?), we were introduced to another breakfast favourite: mekitsa is deep fried dough (vetkoek), very light inside and crispy on the outside, served with powdered sugar. To die for, doll!
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Booking.com offered no cheap hotel options in Dupnitsa. Once here, we hunted down three options advertised via Google Maps. The Universal Hotel was undergoing extensive renovations; the old man at Feel Yourself had no idea what we were talking about though we showed him a photograph of the house out of which he had stepped (the last review was four years ago - perhaps another Covid business death); the Hotel Orenda welcomed us in though it has clearly seen better days and it advertises itself in such an understated way that we're surprised it attracts any clients at all. The shower is virtually perfect (great pressure, shower head and plenty of very hot water), if you don't mind straddling the loo while you bathe!
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There are loads of stray and / or loose dogs in Bulgaria. Oddly, those encountered on the road are less inclined to bark at us than those enclosed behind fences, often chained on too-short chains. These bark to let us know they see us and to make sure we see them. Today one determined creature poked his snout through a small hole in a wooden gate. The hole was so small that once his snout was out, filling the entire hole, there was no way he could actually see us. All we could see was a barking snout.
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Tomorrow 60km to Sofia.