I wouldn’t have minded staying in London for September, but now I don’t have access to my house it works out too expensive. So it left me needing somewhere to go for a month or so whilst I monitored accommodation prices in Orgiva. Somewhere cheap, ideally.

The problem was, where?

I googled where is cheap in Europe. There were no surprises in the answer and the usual suspects came up: Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, Estonia etc, etc.

I selected Bulgaria.

Firstly, I’ve been hearing some good things about Bulgaria. Secondly, it’s a big transport hub, so if I didn’t like it I could easily travel on to somewhere else.

Sofia is a popular destination for digital nomads and also for digital start-up companies. It has fast internet speeds, plus if you are looking for employees it has a well educated young population and low wages.

As well as young entrepreneurs Bulgaria also attracts a small ex-pat population of retirees, encouraged by cheap property prices (you can still find properties here for 15-20,000 euros), although the retirees tend to settle in other parts of the country rather than Sofia.

I thought the good internet speeds would give me chance to work on a few ideas that have been running through my head, whilst the low prices would enable me to live within my means for the month.  So here I am.

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Anyway, Sofia then.   I rented an attic on Airbnb (yes I am now literally the mad woman in the attic).

My attic in Sofia

From here I can walk into the city centre in ten to fifteen minutes.

The Mosque, on the site of an old bath house

Although Sofia is a spa town this hasn’t yet been exploited the way it has, for example, in Budapest.

Vitosha Bulevard, chock-a-block with cafes shops and restaurants.  In the background you can see Vitosha mountains, just a bus ride away.  I haven’t been there yet but supposed to be excellent for hiking in summer and skiing in winter.

The cathedral.  There are also many churches, a Mosque and a synagogue in the city.  Someone was telling me that back in Sofia’s communist days, when church-going was discouraged, they used to show lots of American movies over religious holidays, in the hope that would make people stay in and watch TV instead.  

central market

Just one of the two huge aisles crammed full of home hair-dye products; it’s as if having a badly done home hair colour is compulsory here.  I should fit in well.