Figure 8 On A Bike

Saying we had "a final leg to Omaha" is a bit of an over-simplification, though. Step 1 - get back to Sofia. We saddled ourselves with all the bags but only had to walk as far as the curb, since we cheated a little and called a cab to take us the half-mile to the office where our transfer would pick us up; my back had been feeling kind of unhappy for a bit so I didn't relish the idea of waddling the whole way. We left Bansko and after another hot few hours in a Bulgarian shuttle van we spilled out back at the Cathedral of Alexander Nevsky too early for check in at our hotel in Sofia . So we had a perfect amount of time to picnic on the benches and feed the pigeons a few crumbs. Selfie of us laden down with all the bags

After struggling to meet our winter sports ambitions in Romania, Susan and I were wishing for a few last days of decent skiing in Bansko, one of the largest ski resorts in Bulgaria. We hauled our bags up out of the cave apartment into the bright sunshine, and despite the mid-morning warmth in Sofia the slopes of Vitosha mountain to the south still shone white with snow. We remained hopeful that the online reports of a decent snowpack up high would bear out and that, even without any powder, some nice, consistent pistes would hold on against the heat. Our bus to Bansko (there is a train but true to stereotypes the Bulgarian train takes longer than the bus) didn't leave until about lunchtime, so despite Susan's antsy-ness I dawdled in the apartment and we left about 10 minutes later than intended. This wouldn't have mattered much, except that finding the bus that goes to Bansko turned out to be a bit of a scavenger hunt. First, we'd asked our taxi driver to drop us off...

At this point in the trip we were feeling a little discouraged, a little gray, a little tired of packing, and a little ready to relax. We couldn't quite start this second round in Brașov relaxing; however, as we had to check out of the hotel and check into the Airbnb where we had left our stuff. Our host wasn't getting back to us, so when we checked out of our hotel, we used the codes from the last time to get into the complex. We snatched some shoes from our pile of stuff in the laundry room and left our mountaineering gear in the pile. Unburdened, we headed out for another day of sightseeing in Brașov. We checked out some places we hadn't seen during our first stay in Brașov. Like Rope street which claims to be Europe's narrowest alley. We enjoyed the street art and graffiti before heading towards Biserica Ortodoxa Sfântul Nicolae and the First Roman School. It was steadily raining and we were looking forward to hiding inside the museum. Alas, when we arrived...