Sofia Adventures
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As this Balkan blog approaches our one year anniversary, I’ve been thinking a lot about why we are writing Sofia Adventures and what we hope you get out of it. Since Allison and I both have our own travel blogs (mine’s History Fangirl and she writes Eternal Arrival), and we’ve both been blogging separately since 2015 and have covered places in the Balkans on our own website, some would think starting another website to cover just the Balkans would be crazy. Yet we wanted to do something more than just document the places we go with travel tips. We wanted to put together a comprehensive website to help people do what we love to do: travel the Balkans

So here are seven ways you can use this Balkan travel blog to help inspire, plan, and travel.

Learn About the Balkans

Serbia - Belgrade - House of Flowers and Museum of Yugoslavia Map

The Balkans are the countries located on the Balkan penninsula…which is a lot bigger region than just the former Yugoslavia

A lot of our readers come to us curious about the Balkans, and we’re so happy to help answer these questions! We have articles about which countries count as Balkan countries, articles about different regional cuisines so you can learn what Romanian food or Greek food is, and descriptions of various holidays and festivals like Baba Marta and the Surva Festival.

We know that not everyone is ready to come travel here yet, but so many people are curious about what life is like on the peninsula. 

While these articles are far from a complete overview, we’re always working on new posts to highlight the best of the Balkan festivals, customs, cuisine, and traditions to help spread an understanding abroad about these wonderful cultures.

Discover New Places

Bulgaria - Communist Monuments Tour - Stephanie

We love traveling to villages we haven’t heard of before. There’s so much beauty in this region three years or thirty just wouldn’t be enough.

Our next goal is to help readers learn about new places in the Balkans that they’ve never heard of before. That’s why we’re hard at work on our series about the best places to visit in each country. We know that a lot of people have heard of Transylvania, Sofia, and Belgrade, but you might be curious to learn about more off-the-path (but equally or more beautiful) places like Bucovina, Arbanasi, and Vojvodina

See also
7 Fabulous Balkan Ski Resort and Winter Holiday Ideas

That’s why we make sure to write about the places we love in the Balkans, from the big cities to the small. And it’s also why we’re hard at work on our “Best Places to Visit” series:

Albania: 15 Incredible Places to Visit in Albania

Bosnia and Herzegovina: 11 Stunning Places to Visit in Bosnia & Herzegovina

Bulgaria (coming soon)

Croatia: 23 Best Places to Visit in Croatia: What to See & Do!

Greece: Where to Go in Greece: 27 Top Greece Vacation Destinations

Kosovo: 5 Best Places to Visit in Kosovo

Montenegro: 17 Awe-Inspiring Places to Visit in Montenegro

North Macedonia: 21 Mind-Blowing Places to Visit in Macedonia

Romania (coming soon)

Serbia (coming soon)

Slovenia: 27 of the Best Places to Visit in Slovenia

Turkey: 17 of the Best Places to Visit in Turkey for Culture & Adventure Lovers

Get Travel Inspiration

Romania - Sibiu - Castelul de Lut Valea Zanelor

Some places just catch your imagination, and you physically can’t sit still until you see them for yourself.

Once someone knows a place exists, it doesn’t mean they just rush out and buy a plane ticket. (Okay sometimes Allison and I do, but most people aren’t as insane as us). That’s why we love creating photo essays and Instagram guides to our favorite Balkan places.

Our hope is that by showing you some of the most magical corners of these Balkan cities, you’ll be as enchanted by this part of the world as we are. So whether it is showing your photos of a snowy Meteora or our favorite Instagram spots in Belgrade, we want you to imagine how great it would be to see these places for yourself. 

Learn the Rules of Each Country

Bulgaria - Border to Serbia - Allison with Dog

There are just some things that have to be done before you leave, and we want to help you keep track of them.

Unlike traveling in the Schengen Zone, the Balkans is twelve countries with ten visa schemes. Add on top of that the fact that there are nine currencies, three major alphabets in use, and multiple language families, and a simple backpacking trip can start to seem complicated.

See also
The 10 Balkans Itinerary Commandments (Plus Sample Itineraries)

That’s why we’re working on guides to help you plan your trip to each country and posts on travel tips, plus regional guides to the big topics like how Balkan currency works or how to road trip in the Balkans. Whenever some big topic seems like it needs to be addressed at the regional level (which you can find on our Balkans page) we want to put out a guide to help you easily navigate this big, beautiful, complicated peninsula.

Here are all of our country planning guides:

Albania (coming soon)

Bosnia and Herzegovina (coming soon)

Bulgaria: Planning a Trip to Bulgaria

Croatia: Planning a Trip to Croatia

Greece: Planning a Trip to Greece

Kosovo (coming soon)

Montenegro (coming soon)

North Macedonia: Planning a Trip to Macedonia

Romania: Planning a Trip to Romania

Serbia: Planning a Trip to Romania: Your Travel Checklist

Slovenia: Planning a Trip to Slovenia

Turkey: (coming soon)

Create Your Trip Itinerary

Turkey - Canva - Cappadocia - Best Places to Visit in Turkey

It helps so much to know where to get the best pics and which tour companies have the best reviews.

After you know where to go and how to get there, we want you to have the best time! That’s why we put together guides to help you pick out your activities, like our massive 101 Incredible Things to Do in Sofia and 101 Exciting & Unique Things to Do in Belgrade. We really know and love these places, so we want to give you access to all the info we’ve picked up over the last three years of traveling here. We don’t expect you to see all the places we listed, but you can know what’s available and make choices from there.

We also have guides for some of the best day trips and tours, our favorite restaurants, etc. While far (far) from complete, we’re working on these every day to make this website as close to a one-stop Balkan shop as it can be for you.

See also
25 Balkan City Breaks for the Perfect Quick Getaway

The best way to find this kind of information is on each country’s page:

Albania

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Bulgaria

Croatia

Greece

Kosovo

Montenegro

North Macedonia

Romania

Serbia

Slovenia

Turkey

Support You While You’re Traveling

Bulgaria - Buzludzha - Summer - Allison

Sometimes you just need to pull up a step-by-step guide when you’re on the road to help you with your navigation.

We’ve all been there. You’re on the road, and despite how well you planned your trip, you need a bit more information. Maybe you decided to DIY a day trip or you need to know how to get a Sim Card in the country now that you’re already here.

Whenever we encounter situations on the road where we wished we had practical information, we try to write it down for you. While not complete, we are cataloging how we get places using public transportation, exactly how we do trips when we DIY them, and what it was like getting a SIM card or other basic need.

Look on the country pages for this kind of practical advice. Many of these step-by-step articles are great to bookmark so you can return to them once you’re here. You might appreciate our overview of how to get to Buzludzha while you’re planning, but you’ll love being able to pull up the map in it with the exact coordinates marked once you’re actually here. 

Share Your Own Trip to Help Others

Bulgaria - Burgas - Pink Lake

Spotted: an Instagram husband in the wild

We want you to have a great time in the Balkans, and we want to hear all about it! If you get some information from our post that inspired you or helped you (or has changed since we wrote it), let us know! Come back to the posts and comment with your own updates!

You can also find us on our Instagram @SofiaAdventures. If you use the hashtag #sofiaadventures on your trip, we might feature it on our account. We love seeing your trip photos!

See also
50+ Places to Visit in the Balkans Before You Die

You can also find us on our Facebook Page @SofiaAdventures, where we share our new posts on an ongoing basis and our own trip photos. 

 

Final thought, what can we do to make this Balkan Travel Blog more useful for you when planning your trip? Let us know in the comments!

 

Pin this Balkan Travel Blog to Help Plan Your Trip!

 

Balkan Travel Blog