Rila Monastery, Plovdiv & Balkan Passes: 10 Days

The start is near Vienna. After the group gets acquainted, the motorway leads past Budapest into Serbia, where the night is spent in the centre of Belgrade. After arrival there is time for a walk along the Danube, before the Bulgarian border is reached the next day.

Leaving Belgrade, we cross the densely populated areas on the motorway. Lunch is in the Serbian hinterland, and in the afternoon we reach the Bulgarian border. Before dinner we visit Belogradchik Fortress, a miraculously shaped rock formation.

This stage takes a fantastic route through the Balkan Mountains south to the capital, Sofia. A German-speaking guided city walk reveals the extraordinary history and culture of the city, before the night is spent in Sofia.

The morning leaves time for Sofia's city centre before the way continues into the Rila national park. There the 1,000-year-old Monastery of St. Ivan of Rila, Bulgaria's most important monastery, awaits with a guided visit.

Mount Vihren, at 2,914 m one of Bulgaria's highest peaks, accompanies this stage for almost the entire day. Lunch is in the country's smallest town, known for its sandstone pyramids. The night is spent in the ski resort of Bansko at the foot of the Pirin Mountains.

One of the finest riding days winds through countless curves and past reservoirs into the country's second-largest city. Plovdiv, at the foot of the Rhodope Mountains, was European Capital of Culture in 2019 and counts among the oldest cities in Europe.

After a guided city walk through Plovdiv, the way leaves the Thracian Plain and crosses the Balkan Mountains northward in the afternoon, over one of Bulgaria's most beautiful passes. The former capital sits above the gorge of the Yantra river.

On this stage we cross the Balkan Mountains twice, riding two passes popular with Bulgarian bikers. We spend our last night in Bulgaria at the north-western edge of the Fore-Balkan, in the small town of Montana.

In the morning we cross the Danube northward and with it the border into Romania. Here too, freshly resurfaced roads await. The night is spent in the Banat Mountains, in the former imperial mining town of Reșița.

To close, we cross the Romanian-Hungarian border together. The guide accompanies the group a little further through Hungary until just before Budapest, before everyone continues home independently with plenty of memories in tow.