Borovets 2007

This season's snowboarding came about on the cheap and with a bunch of strangers. Leon had organised our trip to Bulgaria for £300 each, less than half what I paid last year to go to Chamonix.

Upon reaching the Hotel Bor (Bulgarian for Pine tree - which Borovets is mostly covered in) our rep was eager to get us out to the nearest bar for the introduction meeting. She had arranged transport in the mode of horse & carts. "How quaint" I thought before we sat in the things and caught a heady whiff of the horses' back ends. Still, an entertaining ride followed when the drivers shook the reigns & dragged us over the bumpy, icy roads with little to no braking ability and an alarming amount of travel in the suspension springs. Welcome to Bulgaria!

The first few days boarding felt quite limited as the lack of new snow meant that about half the resort was shut. We spent most of our time up top where the chance of finding a patch of meadow was at it's least. There's a distinct lack of snowboarders in Borovets & as a result skiers had free reign making bloody moguls. There were no steep parts of any piste though so they only served to give tiny amounts of air, mid-run, and to inspire the building of a larger hump of snow. It was time to get creative with our use of the slopes.

At the top of the highest open red run we scoped the perfect site for our kicker. Snowboards are really just double-ended shovels (or giant trowels). With four boards working together the kicker was up in no time & held fast. Time now for the hard work, hiking up the thigh-deep snow, creating a stairway to a point from where we could gather enough speed for take off.

By this time we had attracted some attention. Apart from those wishing only to see us face-plant into our landing area we met some skiers from Rochester who had just returned from Canada where they had been practising jumps for weeks. A few 360's by them and very un-professional looking jumps from us and the stairway was becoming easier to climb. The runway became faster and with the help of two hip-flasks of scotch at 2500m our confidence grew into what has been known in the last few seasons as 'cheeky time.'

By night Borovets pumps. It's mostly full of young brits aht-on-tha-lash. Aside from listening to the classic-rock busker and drinking £1 beers in the Happy Duck we sampled different boozers every night, in every corner of the town. We arrived at the Titanic bar a little too late to catch the scheduled pub-crawl organised by our rep but upon spying the 90-or-so tequila shots being poured out on the bar it was clear that in Borovets, a pub crawl is slightly akin to a bus, you just get on when it stops. During our 'bus ride' that night we saw some of the most horrendous sights; brits in the karaoke bar, brits stealing kegs of beer, brits falling arse-over-tit on the black ice outside, you get the idea, but somehow it became amusing as the night rolled on...

Paul & Hurls, who had declined the invitation to come out, started the next morning somewhat earlier than us & were less than impressed with our 2pm piste arrival.

Striken with the flu in the last two days I opted for alternatives to snowboarding. Leon & I met an estate agent and went to see the property development where he has bought a studio flat off-plan. Bulgarian safety regulations state that visiting a building site requires no hard-hat, one must shake the hand of every enthusiatic builder and pretend to understand them in your best Bulgarian and that one must be accompanied by the site manager's alsatian at all times. Life in this valley must be quite entertaining. We saw goats eating fences, horses roaming the streets like wild dogs and a farmer herding his turkeys along a footpath with a long, wispy stick.

Before leaving the country we were offered a super-touristy trip around the capital, Sofia, starting at the cathedral of St. Alexander Nevsky. My camera at the ready I was hoping to find some authentic Bulgarian folk-musicians busking. I did spot three blind women singing in a bus shelter but given their melodic short-comings I declined to press record, opting instead to simply furnish their half washing-up bottle with some pocket change.

Stomachs all round were grumbling & the 'Bar Happy Grill' turned up at the right time. Upon entering we couldn't help but notice the three Mafia guys. It was the classic godfather dress; black leather jacket with sheepskin lapels, white suit white shirt white tie, dripping in both gold sovereigns and hair grease. "Don't stare" we all said to each other but it was useless, this was like a scene from the Simpsons with Fat Tony, involuntary sniggering ensued. No photos of these dudes I'm afraid, best to leave the country wearing shoes of leather, rather than concrete.



Eating in Sofia is really quite affordable. Six of us ate starters, two mains (fresh off the slopes, we were hungry) and had two drinks each. When the bill arrived we thought "it must be in Euros," but no, we were told that this was in Bulgarian Levs which meant that our entire table of food & drinks had set us back a whopping £25. "The mafia must be on hard times..."

All in all Borovets was brill. Next year I'd like to sample some American piste as it seems to heave with powder in the USA for most of the season. But at the price it cost us, I'd take Borovets as a second boarding holiday any year.